About Time the Local Media Pointed This Out

Wayne Garcia writes a must-read blog post. This is the kind of blogging that other Tampa bloggers are afraid to touch. Garcia targets the bigotry of the local blog scene. I'm glad someone in the local media is pointing out this stupidity.

Rachel Moran has the less-than-brilliant brainstorm of filming homeless people getting assaulted by her friends.

We are thinking about proving this nuisance and need for civil action by making a short film called “Eddie Rolls on the Homeless,” whereby Mark secretly videotapes me and Lil Sis in a variety of situations to see how many homeless people approach us and, then, how many of these situations escalate into harrassment. Then, he’s gonna videotape Eddie in the same scenarios, only Eddie is going to beat up every homeless person who escalates the contact after being told that his panhandling is illegal and annoying.

Let's make this clear. What Moran proposes is illegal. This isn't funny. It's a crime and should be treated as such. Feel free to contact the St. Petersburg police department about this post.


District I
(southern
St. Petersburg)
551-3181

District II
(north and northeast
St. Petersburg)
551-3182

District III
(western
St. Petersburg)
551-3183


Tim Fasano laments the fact that Martin Luther King has a national holiday.

Was MLK really color blind? I know his followers are not. Why is it that a racial separatist holiday that can only really be celebrated by one race has been rammed down our throats?

MLK was not a separatist. He talked about blacks and whites living together with dignity. King was jailed and assaulted fighting for civil rights. Yet, he still believed in the path of nonviolence. That is not something Moran is preaching.

Fasano mocks King by writing, "MLK was not a perfect man." It certainly takes an imperfect man to spot the imperfections in another. As it takes a racist to call another man a "separatist."

Update: Sine.Qua.Non saved the Rachel post. Now it is forever on the internet.

Jill, Lindsay, and Roxanne posted their own thouhts on the Rachel post.

Jill:

You’re planning on beating up homeless people on video and it’s panhandling that’s illegal and wrong?

I suspect that Rachel and her friends are under the impression that beating someone up in response to verbal harassment is self defense. She may have a problem demonstrating that in court, though, when her idea to attract as many homeless people as possible and then physically assault them is published on the internet, and the crime is videotaped.

Lindsay:

You got that..right? He was probably going to touch Rachel's sister's hair. Probably. So Rachel ordered him to back up. He froze. An argument ensued. Long story short, Rachel and her friends kicked the shit out of a guy for probably being about to touch her little sister's hair.

Roxanne:

Save Tokyo (because most of the homeless are squared away in the "shame-free" zone of Ueno Park), I haven't lived in a single city where aggressive panhandling wasn't a concern. Yet, somehow, it never occurred to me that the way to combat this horrid scourge upon our nation was to beat up the perpetrators on film.

Alex Pickett has written several articles about the homeless for Creative Loafing. He finds this comment by Miss Moran amusing.

“How many girls in their twenties are afraid of walking alone in the well-lit areas of suburban Des Moines?”

Pickett writes this in the Blurbex comments.

When I volunteered for a Des Moines youth shelter five years ago, the director told me that Des Moines has the largest population of homeless youth in the country. As far as homeless in suburban Des Moines? Check out the Jan. 19, 2006 issue of their alternative weekly on the rise of homelessness in the city’s suburbs.

http://www.dmcityview.com/archives/2006/01jan/01-19-06/cover.shtml

Facts — they are such pesky things.

Aren't they?

Update: here's another saved version of the Rachel post. I'm not expecting it to stay online.

Update: Rachel defends her post in the comments of Progressive Gold. I'm not surprised.

Money quote:

The real point - agressive homeless people require aggressive action.

My God - she sounds like Dirty Harry.

Update: Gene Smith has a post and is urging people to call the St. Petersburg police department.

Update: I have a list of Sticks of Fire advertisers. Feel free to contact them about Rachel Moran's post.

Sticks of Fire Ad List

Update: Attorney and homeless advocate Jackie Dowd has a post up on the subject.

Update: Paul the Spud has a great post. He notices the similarities Rachel and Scrooge.