Ed Haas

Gangs, Drugs, and Mental McMasterbation

December 31, 2004 -- Mental McMasterbation is what I call it when the Attorney General of South Carolina, Henry McMaster holds a press conference, with airbrushed gang t-shirts as his props, in an attempt to convince the wholesome, church-going, God-fearing, closet drinking, porn site surfing, prescription pain killing pill popping people of South Carolina that there is a sinister, secretive society of Satan-like snakes lurking in the shadows of suburbia, and if we don't get medieval on them quick these gangs are going to burn our villages, steal our children, and make off with our riding lawnmowers! Mommy, make the bad men go away!

What McMaster failed to mention during his December 29th press conference was that South Carolina will soon be locking up an even greater number of black people in our state prisons by using the state grand jury to mislead, manipulate, and threaten young minorities into ratting on their friends, or worse, fabricating stories that they believe the state wants to hear so that the government can arrest even more minorities and put them all, the whole gang, behind bars - all in the name of fighting the so-called drug-related violence courtesy of the state-created profits margins of prohibition. Isn't that wonderful!

To reassure the public that his state grand jury scheme will not unfairly target blacks or other minorities, McMaster pointed out that "gang activity cuts across all racial and income levels." Well that's a load off of my mind because I don't want my tax dollars funding some twisted, evil police action that targets poor people or minorities. You know what I mean? But just to make sure the Attorney General didn't misspeak, I'm going to run over to the South Carolina Department of Corrections web site to visit the 66.1% of white inmates and 29.5% of black inmates that are serving state time on drug-related charges. That shouldn't be a problem because according to the 2003 U.S. Census Bureau, that's the break down of South Carolina's population by race - 66.1% white and 29.5% black. So the percentage of white inmates and black inmates that are incarcerated for Dangerous Drugs should somewhat mirror the U.S. Census Bureau figures because we know that illegal drug use isn't race specific, meaning that the percentage of white folks and black folks using illegal recreational drugs is about equal. Be right back...

Now wait a minute here! Is this somebody's idea of a joke? Well if it is it's not funny! Whose bright idea was it to have so many black people from South Carolina lie on their U.S. Census Bureau survey by claiming that they were white? Very funny people, very funny. Well I now know the truth, and you're not going to believe it but South Carolina isn't 66.1% white and 29.5% black. Not even close! South Carolina is 83.5% black, 15.2% white, and 1.3% other. It must be true because that's the exact black / white ratio of inmates currently serving time in South Carolina for so-called dangerous drugs. What other possible explanation could there be? Surely we have not created and are not enforcing laws that unfairly target a particular race or class of people, are we? I mean there's no way that social-economical environments cause a certain class of people to participate in criminal activities just so they can live above the poverty line, is there? I should think not. Every person has an equal opportunity to succeed in South Carolina, right? So there's no excuse whatsoever for any person to get involved in black market activities, correct? I didn't think so.

Well thank goodness that's settled. Wow! I was getting worried about nothing. Here all along I thought this whole war on drugs thingy was just some elaborate hoax to keep state employees, law enforcement, politicians, and lawyers employed, while slapping the convicted felon label on people who will ultimately then feed the system until the day they die, but not before their children become convinced that they are destined for prison too; that their role in life is to break the law to keep the system running. Boy, do I feel stupid! Well at least I can sleep easy tonight knowing that the South Carolina Attorney General isn't creating policies that purposely target a particular race or class of people. What a load off my chest. Lying about your race on the census...Classic! Now thats funny!

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