Buffalo, City Grill Shooting, and Black America: "The Crazies" Come to Life?

One of the better films of 2010 has been the horror movie The Crazies. Set in a small (apparently all-white) town in Iowa, the movie centers around the town sheriff and his pregnant wife - a doctor - as they try survive an inadvertent biological attack that is turning the towns inhabitants into remorseless killers:

The film takes place in the fictional town of Ogden Marsh, Pierce County, Iowa, "friendliest place on Earth", whose town water supply is accidentally infected with the "Trixie" virus. After an incubation period of 48 hours, this virus gradually transforms the mental state of the infected into that of cold, calculating, blood-thirsty killers, who then prey on family and neighbors alike.

Peace and tranquility being the natural state of life in Ogden Marsh - a lily-white town - it takes the introduction of a biological weapon to reduce the benevolent citizenry into a crazed, remorseless population of murderers and psychopaths bent on slaughtering one another.

Created by military scientists this fictional pathogen is used to destabilize the enemy in war, creating rampaging lunatics that tear apart each other and bring ruin to the opposition without a shot being fired.

One must wonder if such a virus has been introduced into the major cities of the United States, where murder, crime and mayhem destabilize life on a daily basis. Unlike in the movie The Crazies, a highly communicable virus with the intent on destabilizing a population isn't necessary to induce humans living in major US cities to kill one another flippantly and remorseless.

They do it anyways. Take Buffalo for instance, where a number of people were gunned down this weekend:

The Buffalo Police Department has released the names of the people shot in the Saturday morning shooting at Downtown's City Grill.

The first is Tiffany Wilhite, 32, of Buffalo.

Her father Raymond, who spoke to reporters Saturday, said, "It's just a senseless thing, and it was a senseless, random killing to me and this kind of thing has got to stop."

A party guest described Wilhite as well rounded and perfect.

"When people say perfect, they have no idea," the guest said. "Tiffany had no problems in the world. Brightest future ever, she was perfect. Ever since she was a little girl."

Wilhite's cousin had some advice for the shooter or shooters still at large.

"People just got to wake up, they're not coming back," Monica Lynch said. "Flight with your hands...put the guns down."

"I didn't come here to cry and see Tiffany where she last was," Lynch continued, "I didn't come down here for this, it's time for people to get together and stop it."

Shawntia McNeil was another victim of Saturday morning's shooting.

"She was 25, too young...too young to die," Ruby Martin, McNeil's mother said. She went on to say that, "I hope he gets what he deserves which is to be in jail the rest of his life, since he took several lives this morning."

Both Wilhite and McNeil will be honored in a service on Friday at True Bethel Baptist Church. There will be an 11 am viewing and funeral services at noon.

Officials say the a third victim was the 30 year old groom who was celebrating his one-year anniversary, Danyell Mackin.

According to the Mackin's Vistaprint website, they came into Buffalo from Austin, Texas, where the couple had relocated for work. Danyell and his wife Tanisha were planning a weekend full of wedding festivities in the area that included a formal wedding reception Saturday night and their young daughter's baptism Sunday morning. They also have a son, who is seven.

The other deceased male is Willie McCaa III, 26.

James Robb Jr., 27 and Shamar Davis, 30, were listed in stable condition at ECMC after the incident, and as of Sunday night, they have been discharged. Tillman Ward, 27, was listed in good condition and has also been released. Demario Vass, 30, remains in critical condition in the trauma ICU.

Eight shot, four dead in a Saturday morning shooting on Main Street in Buffalo. Mayor Byron Brown claims the city is safe, but the truth is something similar to the scene in Bruce Almighty when anarchy reigns in the streets.

The movie The Crazies is fiction, a horror film that attempts to scare viewers through macabre scenes that titillate the imagination. Black-on-Black violence - not to mention Black-on-white - that is found in every major city (Chicago, Indianapolis, Atlanta, Detroit) where Black people reside is not a fictional narrative concocted to produce chills and fear.

It is a reality of life -- no virus is the cause nor genesis of such violence -- found in cities small and large alike wherever Black people live.

The violence in Buffalo is part of an epidemic of violence that the media downplays - thank God for Thugreport.com - and though no virus afflicts these communities (like the fictional one that brought ruin to all-white town in The Crazies), Black people are engaging in behavior quite similar to that which required a militarized pathogen in a horror movie:

Rita McCaa continues to grieves as she tries to come terms, over the death of her nephew Willie McCaa Junior.

She says she helped raised him since he was born. The family describes the 26-year old as fun loving person who loved sports, and was a devoted father who lived for his two children.

McCaa was gunned down outside of the City Grill Restaurant, early Saturday morning. His aunt says he was there as part of a separate birthday celebration, and had nothing to do with the Danyell and Tanisha Mackin's wedding anniversary party.

McCaa can't believe he's gone. "He's no longer here, and it's so hard to believe you know, what I'm sayin. It is just hard to believe that my baby is gone. Senseless death."

McCaa's grandmother Margaret says, she last saw him when he left her house Friday afternoon. Although saddened by his untimely death, she says there's room for forgiveness. "Yes, God Forgives. I forgive. Yes I will forgive him but I will like for him to really understand what he done."

Buffalo is a city where crime is becoming as routine as the NFL's Bills losing in the Super Bowl was back in the 1990s. Last year, Black people there decided to attack a white guy for daring to date a girl of the formers race:

Armed with a chunk of concrete, several assailants beat Brian Milligan Jr. on the back of the head on August 18, leaving a 3-inch gash. They kicked him in the face, breaking his jaw.

Bloodied and bruised, the 18-year-old managed to walk five blocks to his grandmother's house before being rushed to the hospital.

Milligan's father believes several African-Americans beat his son, who is white, because he is dating an African-American woman. He wants police to treat the beating as a hate crime. He also has criticized what he calls a deafening silence from the community, police and the national media.

"If this was a black guy who was beaten by a group of white guys for dating a white girl, people would be up in arms," he said. "There's a double standard."

Buffalo police believe a group of about 10 to 15 African-American men attacked Milligan late at night, police spokesman Mike DeGeorge said. Police have made no arrests and are still investigating the motive, he said.

Milligan Sr. says he believes the attackers are the same "neighborhood guys" who threatened his son and his African-American girlfriend because of their interracial relationship.

Buffalo is a town comprised of more than 40 percent Black people, and is beginning to see higher rates of violent crime:

Buffalo's overall crime rate dropped last year, but murders, robberies and assaults all increased.

New statistics from the state reveal a 5 percent jump in violent crime last year even though overall crime dropped 4 percent.

The increase in violent crime — there were 3,920 incidents last year — can betraced to, among other things, a spike in homicides. Murders in the city increased from 37 in 2008 to 60 last year.

"Violent crime is what we should be targeting," said Darnell Jackson, an East Side community activist. "And the way to do that is to get kids off the streets."

The Crazies was a piece of fiction, devised in the mind of a script writer and brought to life by an army of producers, actors and special effects engineers. The virus that warped the minds of the lily-white fictional cities inhabitants wasn't real.

What is happening in America is real, very real. It is even happening in England, where Black people are committing crimes that far outpace the number of those committed by the native population.

And there is no fictional virus to blame. If The Crazies scared you, one could always press stop. Here in Black Run America (BRA), no stop button exits.