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Bicycling while black in Marblehead
By adamg on Sat, 09/05/2015 - 10:34am
The Lynn Item police log for Sept. 2 includes the following item from Marblehead:
A report of two kids bike riding at 9:34 a.m. Monday at Indianhead Circle. Caller reports it is suspicious because the kids on the bikes were black.
Via Bradley.
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Comments
Wow
People don't often just put their prejudice right out there so openly. What, no subterfuge? No coded language or other evasive maneuvers? Interesting choice.
It seems that light has not dawned
on Marblehead after all...
Racism has been going on for
Racism has been going on for years in Marblehead ,recall hispanics fishing off a pier years ago in Marblehead were taunted by neighborhood protesters, Marblehead requirements: must have ancestral roots , must make $350k or more annual income to be accepted, must be White anglo, prefably blonde blue eyed male or female, must drive a $120k plus German automobile, shit boxes not allowed in Marblehead, must own yacht, must have mutual fund, IRA's or family inherent income !
not to
give marblehead a pass on this, but as a latino, a big part of the problem is lack of awareness that this happens, sadly, many places
i am pretty fair skinned and what not so most people have no idea that my family came here on a boat from south america. i've moved into neighborhoods and had a person who literally pointed out where all the minorities lived.
he was what i like to call a 'qualifier'. he would say things like 'oh thats the gay couple, but they're actually pretty cool if you talk to them" or "thats the 'mexican' family, but they don't cause any problems!"
not that it really matters, but since i am literally quoting him i might as well mention that the 'mexicans' were from el salvador and honduras.
you should at least be enough of a bigot to know who you hate, i think
Marblehead 2010 Census
Population:
19,808
Black or Af_Am only:
151 (0.76%), up from 89 in 2000
Edit-Delete?
Could the police department refuse to take the question/complaint if there was no basis for the call? Or could the compiler of the police log or the editor of the newspaper leave it out as trivial (well, much worse than trivial).
If someone called the police department with another total-nonsense complaint .... the birds are singing too loudly or the colors on my neighbors clothesline are too bright..... can't the police just reject the call?
No. Because someone called,
No. Because someone called, it warrants a response. No matter how silly, stupid, absurd or nonsensical the call is, if 911 calls were screened like that, some day someone would end up hurt or dead as a result.
Not everything is as it seems, maybe there's something wrong with the caller and they need mental help, or in some cases, people who can't say they need help will do something like try to order a pizza from 911 because they are being held against their will. Or, maybe the reason the person called seems silly, but its because they don't speak English very well and couldn't properly communicate what they observed.
And how do you know
It wasn't a troll call, just like many so-called hate crimes, from graffiti, to actual alleged assaults, turn out to be faux? The people who engage in such activity inevitably say something along the lines, like: 'I (we) were trying to raise awareness of the issue of fill-in-the-ism / phobia'.
Yeah!
And we should assume every other act of racism we encounter is probably just a misguided activist, too. Dylann Roof? Just a Social Justice Warrior trying to make a point about how black lives really do matter.
Be honest
Have you ever been to a high crime (i.e. poor/black) part of the city, or does your heart always bleed from a safe distance?
Not entirely sure
What that has to do with two people biking in Marblehead. The question says a lot about you, though, and nothing complimentary.
They were probably exploring the rail trail.
I looked up the location. It's near the border with Salem and a few streets meet the old Marblehead Branch near there.
Marblehead is pretty insular and mean. I covered a bunch of its features including the Mass Audubon Sanctuary on Marblehead Neck, one of the best spots for watching spring migration arrivals.It's very exclusive.
The rail trail is fairly popular.
"insular and mean"
you mean like judgmental people who convict an entire town because of what one drunk phoned in to the cops? I moved from Lynn (two of the streets in the police blotter in fact) to Brighton and Allston, working in Cambridge. I saw more racism in Allston and Cambridge than I ever saw in Marblehead. Get over yourselves.
I explored it quite thoroughly over 2 years.
In that time, I made video content for the entire Marblehead Branch Rail Trail .I've made material on Goldthwaite Reservation and the Marblehead Neck Causeway.. They have cool mean signs telling you to go away if you aren't from there.
https://goo.gl/70tTWq
I got 2 clips of Fort Sewall, a bunch for MAS Marblehead Neck where the Fidelity Magellan Fund guy lives. Great mean signs over there too, in profusion.
And I got one of my best 'art' photos of a duck in Ware Pond.
https://goo.gl/FqIysV
And while I like the amenities and had fun making stuff that will send the unwashed there, it is an asshole town, up there with Weston and Dover. I prefer Lynn.
And it is not the fault of the land mass that assholes live there. It was cooler in the 70s back when my aunt was roommates there with Lillian Gish.
you may want to make your contact information available to
little old ladies like your aunt. They may need protection from the newest visitors, the 100 door to door salesmen of "Urban Nation" of Detroit, currently "selling magazine subscriptions" on the North Shore and other local suburbs. Are they racist assholes to avoid being crime victims?
http://www.bostonherald.com/news_opinion/local_coverage/2015/09/police_w...
If you prefer Lynn, knock yourself out. Now that my relatives are gone, you couldn't get me back there to watch E.T. land a spaceship.
Yes, people can be racist in
Yes, people can be racist in how they try to avoid being victims of crime. The fact that they want to avoid being a victim of crime does not make them less racist. It is not ok for anyone to find black skin suspicious and to call the police based on that suspicion. It doesn't matter how many scary things they've seen on the news. People are responsible for their own reactions to the big bad world and if they act racist when they are scared they do not get a pass.
Lillian Gish? Cool!
Lillian Gish? Cool!
That's because...
....there IS usually no other race to commit racism against in Marblehead. Same reason you don't see much racism in Weston.
and we know that
those people hardly ever leave their home towns, right? All I know is my mixed race relatives who live in Marblehead seem to be having a great time, despite the occasional smug, self-satisfied visitors from Boston. (You know, "The Hub of the Universe").
On the bright side
At least they used the word "black", instead of the less-refined terms that numerous children of citizens of a certain less-diverse, non-wealthy suburb to my north have been suspended for on the soccer field.
You mean the word
Many black kids and adults use in almost every other sentence, when talking with other black people?
And seriously, I don't doubt that 'less diverse' non-wealthy' (white trash?) suburb you refer to is still more 'diverse' than the rural town in the Pacific Northwest you came from.
Many kids, teens, use the n-word, when addressing each other, whether they are black or not. Why? I would imagine the huge popularity of rap, and popular culture in general that glorifies 'trash talk', as well as a desire to give the finger to political correctness, has a lot to do with it. B word,bitch, and the P word, pussy, are also popularly used.
One caller out of 19808 and
One caller out of 19808 and you all assume the entire town is in need of sensitivity training? Maybe there should be an A.D.D. test before you're allowed to comment.
What does A.D.D. have to do with it?
You've just given a perfect argument against your point. "Maybe THOSE PEOPLE shouldn't be allowed to comment."
Marblehead is Peninsular and Can't Help Itself
Several years ago, Marblehead had signs up all along the roads that said "Marblehead Salutes Diversity". They are down now; I think that they got tired of the smirks.
Also, in the early 90's, they had fireworks for the 4th of July, but none of the surrounding towns could afford them, since there was a recession. At about 5:00, they blocked off all roads to the town so that no one from outside could see them. They were probably surprised by the anger that resulted.
Racism in Marblehead
Marblehead is NOT a racist town. Marblehead is generally comprised of well meaning people who work hard for what they have and work hard to protect what they have. Has anyone ever wondered why Marblehead has such a low crime rate? One might laugh at the police call log in town but people calling at the sight of anything suspicious is what helps to keep crime low. Is being black while riding a bike suspicious? No. But what most people failed to notice was that two weeks ago there were 5 black males who rode bikes into Marblehead on the railroad tracks and stole a childs bike only to be caught in salem soon after. Additionally 3 Hispanic men were caught last week after 2 house break ins all of whom rode into town on bicycles via the railroad tracks. Most car and house break ins are done by people who are NOT locals. Knowing this most people are suspicious of unfamiliar faces in this small town. Maybe if people in surrounding cities such as Lynn and Salem took notes from places like Marblehead they could begin to lower their massive crime rates.
Suspicious black kids on bikes
Revisiting the Marblehead Police log September 2015.
Hearsay: has many faces. One of which can be the beginning of anyone's desire to pursue the veracity of said hearsay.
A caller reports two black kids riding thier bikes in the neighborhood as suspicious. It's ashame that we live in a society with people like that. How about the police call taker who didn't have common sense enough to word that more sensibly...hold the press! There may be an explanation for that?
Hearsay from one of thier own within: the caller was a high ranking Marblehead police official. Well there you go. The police dispatcher was just following orders and that would make sense. Hearsay: can change its face depending on ones desire to prove veracity. Should one do that, you may just find other atrosities and people victimized by a very abusive police department...