Re: fred, gun courts.

I hear you loud and clear, however, the people that can help do not
care about your situation. They do not care about your family,
friends, or neighbors. They care only about themselves and will in no
way give up the power they have to keep society the way it is.



Bruce Reilly (a.k.a Bruha) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:<[EMAIL 
PROTECTED]>...
> Dear Judges, Lawyers, Policemen, Guards, Counselors, Taxpayers, et. al.,
> 
> We are here.  Like it or not, for good or bad, we are here.  Who are we?  We are the
> downtrodden and dispossesed, the self-torturing, the disenfranchised convicts,
> drug and alcohol addicts, the unemployed and unemployable.  We are the children of
> poverty, financial and spiritual.  We have and will have children of our own,
> grandchildren too.  We are ex-cons, uninsured, homeless, of many colors and speaking
> many tongues.  We are the enemy in what has become a domestic war against ourselves.
> 
> And who are you?  You who like the tough talk of Tough on Crime?  You who watch as
> budgets are cut in education and health care while you militarize a police force?
> Bullet-proof vests, automatic weapons, helicopters, tanks, robots ... the
> testosterone is oozing through the streets, more prisons, longer sentences, tighten
> the belt, spartan conditions, task forces, gang units, gun courts.  And what is there
> to show for it?  Unemployent stays low because half the population oversees those
> "out of the workforce", the dregs, the rabble, the enemy?  Please tell me there is a
> deeper reason.  Do you feel safer?  More humane?  More like a cohesive society with a
> shared sense of purpose, who can identify Us and Them?  Do you live in a gated
> community or gentrified neighborhood?  By the way, have you read the Declaration of
> Independence and US Constitution - or do you only know the first phrases?
> 
> It's about time we got together.  Please know that I have yet to meet a convict who
> wants their child to be a thief, an addict, a dealer, a prostitute, or a violent
> individual.  Most of us still have hope for ourselves even when stuck in the darkest
> dilemmas, ruts and catch-22s.  Most of us believe in crafting laws and instilling
> order.  Many of us have burrowed beneath the surface to find a spiritual sense of
> being, an understanding force at least as powerful as those we succumbed to, and many
> of use wouldn't escape if you opened the front door.  Did you know that approximately
> 10 million Americans are either incarcerated, on probation, on parole or once were in
> those categories?  Each of those 10 million have families, friends, neighbors ... and
> so closer and closer does the We interface with the You.  Don't you think it's time 
> we
> talked?
> 
> Are you ready?  Can you accept that the road we are travelling points toward a grim
> and painful future?  Do you have the heart to face monumental failures while bravely
> struggling beyond where we are now?  I know that some of you are, and that some of us
> are, and this is what gives me hope.  You need our insights just as we need your
> structure.  It is never over, especially when a real solution, a real treatment for
> our sickness, is yet to begin.
> 
>                                                    In Solidarity,
> 
>                                                    Bruce Reilly (a.k.a Bruha)
>                                                    P.O.Box 8274
>                                                    Cranston, RI 02920 USA
> 
> P.S. - I am trying to conceptualize an effective guerilla media campaign to promote
>        this cause.  Ideas are welcome.  Collaboration is prayed.
> 
> 
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