Trash Versus Criminals

I am going to be called a racist and bigot for simply writing what many think. It's time someone called it like it is.

“White” people have a name for lower class and (surprisingly often) under-educated white people and we find it socially acceptable to use this term – white trash. This negative word is not normally used by white people to describe the criminal element in white society though. We call white people who commit crime - criminals.

I hate trashy behavior and detest this culture and inwardly moan when a white trash family moves into my neighborhood. They inevitably cause property values to fall, as they do not tend their yards and this is always the initial sign of neglect. The next flagged behavior is home maintenance and usually a lot of junk appears around their house.

In their defense, they are often friendly people and other than the sloppy way they maintain their house and property they are normal, law-abiding, and fundamentally productive citizens. They work and often that is their excuse as to why their property is in need of maintenance.

I am a “white” person, so it is politically safe, if I call them white trash. In fact, it is a safe-phrase to use by everyone.

A long time ago I learned to differentiate between a person’s skin color and the culture they embrace. I have no problem living next to a family of a different color or nationality, heritage included. The problem I occasionally encounter is culture clash. When a person’s culture clashes or overlaps with mine, there is no longer harmony in our coexistence.

I can certainly appreciate other cultures, especially from a distance, but that doesn’t mean I want to embrace them. For instance I can appreciate beautifully and brightly colored homes, but in the culture I embrace, we paint our homes a more subdued color. I can appreciate a culture which believes in front yard loud parties – the block party, but in my culture, we have our parties in the backyard and friends are pre-invited. When both cultures abide in the same neighborhood, culture clash is the result.

I cannot appreciate the thug world mentality that gangsta music promotes and so many American kids embrace and the avarice and sexual excess it pushes as success.

Culture, not color is the deciding factor for me. This said, in some cultures criminal activity is over-shadowed by an inherent distrust of the police department and this is a problem that needs to be addressed by the civic leaders who so often scream injustice. They should be screaming at the choir.

I personally do not watch the bank job/mob/mafia movies, as I am repulsed by the crime syndicate glorification. I do not watch the Sons of Anarchy series for the same reason. I do not view either of these cultures as white trash, but criminals and they are predominately white people committing the crimes for the record.

Criminals need to be ratted-out for what they are – criminals. No longer should they be tolerated and harbored as neglected, under-privileged, down-trodden, or whatever other excuse is thrown out in their defense. They have predatory and often violent propensities and are a threat.

Time and time again surveillance cameras record men robbing and stealing and no one can recognize them? These men are criminals, not down and outers. It’s time and high time the community moves to rid themselves of these bad people. Read the police report folks. Our police department is diversified and they make no bones about arresting people of their own ethnicity, as is proper.

It is getting very common for people to be robbed at gunpoint in our city and more times than not it is being done by a very well-defined group of men. Enough. Rat out the offenders. Put color aside and go after criminal behavior. Culture is one thing, but crime is crime and is a threat to ever law-abiding citizen.