"Real Detroit Weekly"

Because I like to learn about what's new in my city, I always pick up the free publications located at various places around town. Examples include "Real Detroit Weekly" and "BLAC Detroit" magazine.

The RDW issue of March 3-9 had the Black Eyed Peas on the cover, so I picked it up to read the interview and came across this editorial on a page called, "Vengeance & Fashion" by The Lowdown Carroll. I'm not sure if that attribution is correct, but that's beside the point. In a previous blog, I wrote about Detroit Mayor Dave Bing's proposal to save money by essentially shrinking the city, or moving residents out of the less populated areas to more concentrated areas, thereby saving the need for excess resources. The writer of the editorial in RDW agreed with the plan, and while I'm all for the creative application of metaphors and analogies, this one went a little too far.

Here it is, word for word:

"DAVE BING TO PULL RABBIT OUT OF HAT

Dave Bing has come up with a plan that I fully endorse. Take the last couple people hellbent on living in the city of Detroit and move them all to the same city block or something. You'd need one police office, one garbage man...it's absolutely brilliant.

So with this fantastic plan, of course, come all 12 people in Detroit whining about how they want to stay on their block, and how great that block was once upon a time...like some fu*king fairy tale. Then they will whine about how some drug dealer came and shot their grandson (who was a straight-A student, and so loving, and never had any problems with anyone...give me a fu*king break) in broad daylight!

Look, drastic times call for drastic measures. If you have to start treating the die-hard Detroiters like we did the Native Americans, then I say go ahead and break out the small-pox blankets and the muskets or whatever we used. Or at least put this whole reservation plan into place..."

Wow. That was all I could say in response to this ignorant diatribe. I know he'd probably like to say I'm being hypersensitive, but considering Detroit is mostly populated by a certain minority, and considering the use of "we" by the author, it's hard not to perceive a racial subtext. And since we all know the ill fate of the Native Americans, I shudder at the mere suggestion that Detroiters be subjected to such treatment. Let's say the city in question was a suburb like, oh, Royal Oak or Bloomfield Hills. I doubt the author would even hint at the use of "small-pox blankets" and "muskets," or any such method that was used for genocide.

And Detroiters, if you're leaving the city to go be neighbors with people like the author of this editorial, then...good luck to you.