No Matter the Violence, The Black Expo in Indianapolis is too Black to Cancel

It's only funny because there is truth in his speech

In season two of Family Guy (only the first two season were funny) there is an episode called I am Peter, Hear Me Roar. Peter Griffin learns to appreciate women in this episode and addresses the Million Man March, telling them it is their fault their is crime:

[At the Million Man March]Jesse Jackson: My brothers, we need to stand together... 

Peter [interrupts Jesse Jackson]: Excuse me! I'd like to say a couple of truths to the men in this audience. It's your fault we have so much crime in this country! And it's your fault we have so much violence in this country! You are ruining our society, and you should be ashamed! 

[An angry mob is seen yelling and chasing Peter]

The joke being that Peter was just addressing men in general, but the Million Man March was merely many Black men. We'll explore this theme in comedy later this week, but this joke is only funny because it is grounded in truth.

And nowhere is this truth more evident then Indianapolis. This weekend is the vaunted Black Expo, an event that last year descended into horrible violence that seems to accompany events put on exclusively for Black people.

This year, unbelievable amounts of resources were allocated to ensuring the safety of not only the Black Expo participants, but the citizens of Indianapolis and private property as well:

The Indiana Black Expo's Summer Celebration is working hard to overcome the stigma of violence from year's past. In 2010, 10 young people (ages 10 to 19) were hurt in three separate shootings following events during the Summer Celebration in downtown Indianapolis. 

This year, a committee focused on safety for the event said it's making changes to make the Summer Celebration more family friendly. Changes include the addition of a climbing wall in the "Fun Zone," a NASCAR exhibit and a hair-styling competition. The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department will have approximately 500 officers on patrol, enforcing the 11 p.m. curfew for kids 14 and younger and a 1 a.m. curfew for teens 15 to 17 years old.

Is no one embarrassed by this? Are the economic benefits of the Black Expo for the city of Indianapolis large enough to justify putting 500 extra officers on patrol? Wouldn't it be easier just to cancel the event or would the negative public relations fall-out be too much of a Black-eye for the city?

Obviously cancelling the Black Expo Summer Celebration is not an option in Black-Run America (BRA), so a mass of volunteers, police and resource officers are required to keep the peace. This is from the Indy Star and it describes - in morose detail - what must be done to keep the peace during Black Expo 2011:

An army of peacekeepers will complement a police contingent at this year's Indiana Black Expo Summer Celebration in an effort to avoid a repeat of violence that marred last year's event. 

Public Safety Director Frank Straub said 25 community affairs officers, who are trained to work with youths, will be among the nearly 300 uniformed officers and 300 church volunteers working the last two nights of the 41st annual event, which begins July 7.
"It will be a coordinated effort to keep order," he said. 

Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department Deputy Chief Mike Bates said 275 uniformed officers will work the final Friday of Expo, and 290 will work the next night -- about the same as last year. In addition, undercover detectives will patrol the streets. 

The volunteers, 200 more than last year, will act as a buffer between the public and police, said the Rev. Charles Harrison of the Ten Point Coalition, a faith-based group focused on finding solutions to community issues. 

"They'll be making sure the kids behave," said Harrison, whose group is organizing the volunteer effort. "If they see them using inappropriate language or acting up, they'll intervene -- kind of surrogate parents for the unsupervised children." 

Dax Baxter, 14, who lives on the Northeastside, said he will attend the Expo for the first time with his father. 

"Am I nervous about it? No," he said. "But I'm thinking about it. I'm going to be careful. I'm definitely going to be careful and be cool and pray that nothing happens. 

"I know that something can happen just like that when people get in a crowd, and I guess it would be smartest to just stay away." 

Three shootings injured 10 people on the last weekend of Expo in 2010. Police said rival youth street gangs that carried a grudge sparked the shootings Downtown. 

An Indiana Black Expo task force, formed after the shootings, focused on ways to keep youths from lingering on the streets and, instead, engaged in activities inside the Indiana Convention Center. 

The task force concluded in a report that many teens come Downtown not for Summer Celebration but to hang out among the large crowds.

The task force estimated that as many as 6,000 teenagers congregate around the Hyatt Regency Downtown on Expo's final Saturday. The task force encouraged strict curfew enforcement.
Expo Executive Director Tanya Bell said events in the convention center have been improved. She said a celebrity basketball game is free, with a slam dunk contest added, and the hall will host a Mardi Gras parade, gospel recording artists, a hair styling exhibition and a NASCAR display. 

"We want families to come as families and enjoy family events," Bell said.
Task force member Jeffery Johnson, senior pastor of Eastern Star Church, sees improved events during Indiana Black Expo as key.

"We have to let them know they have options to hanging out on the street, and we need to do a better job of letting them know," he said. "I don't think a kid says, 'Let's go Downtown and stand at the corner of Illinois and Meridian for three days.' That isn't any fun. Many want to be informed, educated, they want to hear . . . good music or see comedy acts." 

The effort to get youngsters inside isn't a new one. 

After two Downtown shootings in 2006 that were not related to Expo but occurred afterward, organizers met with then-Mayor Bart Peterson. 

Their solution: Get teens inside and enforce curfew.

Olgen Williams, deputy mayor for neighborhood affairs, said getting teenagers to attend the events is only part of the answer. More important is getting them to behave, he said.
"There's a certain number of kids that like to walk around the street and be in the crowd," Williams said. "That's their right, and there's not much you can do about that. They need a cordial reminder of social norms.

"But there will always be knuckleheads in the crowd that succumb to peer pressure and stir it up. We need to keep them moving."

He said parents need to keep the children by their side.

"Nothing beats direct parental supervision," Williams said. "If your kid is 13, 14, 15, you should be with him. He isn't going to act up if you are."

The community affairs officers will wear khaki pants and golf shirts and concentrate on cooling down or preventing hostile situations. The 25 officers are members of a newly formed unit. They are specially trained to work with young people, gang members, the elderly, immigrants, the homeless and the mentally ill.

Democratic mayoral challenger Melina Kennedy, who has criticized Mayor Greg Ballard's record on fighting crime, said she hadn't seen details of the city's security plan but noted, "My plan would also include working with community and faith leaders, parents and law enforcement to enforce the curfew and ensure that minors are supervised."

Straub and Harrison said a key to keeping order will be to avoid "clumping" by police officers.
"Officers tended to gather at corners, but much of the trouble was brewing in the middle of the block," Straub said. The police this year will be spaced along the block, he said.
Nothing is foolproof, Harrison said. 

"Fifteen minutes before the shootings last year, our volunteers had defused a situation between those two gangs," he said. "We thought it was over, but obviously it wasn't."

Though the Indy Star has removed the original article from its Web archives,  a small section of the city (read: all-Black) is responsible for some of the highest rates of crime in the entire city. Sadly, former Indianapolis Colts Tony Dungee - mentor to troubled Black NFL players like Plaxico Burress and Michael Vick - never volunteered his services to mentor this troubled area:

The triangular swath of land — two miles across — that makes up IMPD’s North District Beat 23 is deceptively tranquil. 

Shady, narrow streets slope gingerly toward Fall Creek on the western border, where industrial retailers face the curving stream. On the interior, between 30th and 38th streets, elderly homeowners live in small bungalows, and younger, low-wage workers rent the others.

But the area of 6,000 residents has had more homicides than any other police sector in the city over the past 3 1/2 years. This decade, 47 people have been shot, stabbed or beaten to death on the beat, a rate more than 20 times the national average. 

Poverty, abandoned and decaying homes, broken families, drugs and a culture of violence all play a role, community residents said. And over time, they said, law-abiding residents become discouraged, and determination dissolves into resignation. 

“After a while, the junk starts to accumulate and apathy sets in,” said Durmon Jones, executive director of the United North East Community Development Corp. “Then the condition becomes acceptable, and that is not a good condition.” 

The violence, or the threat of it, requires unblinking vigilance, parents say. For them, the daily battle is keeping their kids out of jail, out of the hospital, out of the morgue. 

Odelle Skinner had driven a white moped into a gas station on Keystone Avenue at 8 p.m. April 22. As he did, a teenage boy on a bicycle rolled up and shot Skinner in the back and shoulder. The kid pedaled south on Keystone. Skinner’s cousin pulled out a handgun and fired, missing the bicyclist. 

Officer Jackson was on the scene quickly. Skinner was taken to Wishard Memorial Hospital in critical condition. He told police he didn’t know who shot him or why. 

“That’s the code,” Jackson said. “People don’t like to tell the police things. You can get shot again for that.” 

Jackson said he had warned Skinner four days earlier that he was going to get shot one day if he kept running the streets. 

“Some things,” Jackson said, “you can see coming.”

Indianapolis is a city that proves the joke from Family Guy is only funny because it is true. Resources that cost a lot of time and money must be allocated to policing the 2011 Black Expo in Indianapolis because the city is fearful of a repeat of 2010. Because of Black-Run America and the threat of economic boycott by Black people and condemnation by Disingenuous White Liberals (DWLs) in the national media, the event can not be cancelled.

We already have learned that Atlanta, Baltimore and Newark are preparing for Black violence this summer. We know why firework celebrations are being cancelled nationwide. How much money are other cities spending to keep Black events from turning into a repeat of the Black Memorial Day events of 2011?

Chicago refuses to even acknowledge that Black people are engaging in the monolithic Mahogany Mobs that terrorize the entire city.

Until the day comes when people no longer fear BRA, we can only laugh at comedians like Daniel Tosh, Dave Chappelle, and this hilariously accurate clip from Family Guy, because truth can only be masked in humor right now.

But as Indianapolis shows, there is one group that should be ashamed of the violence there.










Watch: Family Guy - Peter's Speech At Million Man March