JENA 6 OJ 2

As you can see by the photo below I've been otherwise occupied at WSS to do much protesting. Otherwise I'd have been in Jena, La. this week, on the bus with the Rev. Al and the rest. No Justice. No Peace. I hear ya MF. But then, after all the hubbub died down and the hoards left Dixie,, Michael Bell had to do another long weekend in jail. A juvenille court, on Friday, denied Mr. Bell bail. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. But that was all I heard. No media outlet went deeper. I'm sure Amy Goodman will catch me up on Monday morning. While she's at it I hope she touches on OJ. Armed robbery? Kidnapping? And is OJ in jail? Don't think so. Hasn't the issue always been how the American justice system fucks with the black man? If Michael Bell and OJ are both black men shouldn't they be treated equally poorly? A poor kid does 10 months and counting. A rich, twisted celeb. skates. Infamy gets you a bye black or white.
Race is definitely the issue in Jena, but a wider issue across the board is money. I remember when Democracy Now broke the Jena story and you could tell immediately just how fucked these kids and their families were. The DA wouldn't even let the families in the court room as they railroaded their sons. They were the working poor, without access to decent lawyers, who could've made this all go away with some community service. Had the tables been turned the white boys would've walked. Had the tables been turned and a beaten up black kid (who incidentally walked out the hospital that day and went to a school function that evening), the perpetrators would've been portrayed as the school boys they were. Not even gross trauma would've been justification for these sentences.
I have a Cut the Juice Loose T shirt that I got back in the day and just recently started wearing again. I figured enough time had passed since the Ron Goldman and Nicole horror. OJ had layed low enough to become a sad pop culture reference. It was in bad taste- but cool bad taste. Now OJ's fucking back and slimier than ever. I can't bring myself to wear the T shirt anymore. Michael Bell is still in jail and OJ's playing golf. NO justice. NO peace.