Crimes and Criminals

by Sherman Pitt

Criminal - of or involving crime; guilty of crime
Criminalize - to make criminal; outlaw

Is any action in and of itself a crime? Is any person in and of themselves a criminal? I submit that all humans are criminal by nature - some just haven't been caught!

With the "war on crime and criminals" in the USA for the last 20 long hard years, you'd think all the criminals would be caught and incarcerated by now. Yes, I know with the obvious exception of the rich criminals making the laws...

I hear the battle-cry "criminals deserve what they get". Hear! Hear! Well spoken! But what of the innocent I ask? Well, they should be protected of course. But the question to ponder is not "by whom" but "from whom". Who are the real criminals? Those who brazenly trample innocent citizen's rights, property, and lives in the name of profit and ill-gotten gains? Or those who do so in the name of the "long arm of the law"? Is either one above the other in truth or reality? I think not but why not?

The United States began a beautification of the penal system after the Attica "uprising", and this led to a whole new classification of abuses. They're the same abuses of older times, just a new classification process.

Consider there are no more convicts in the penal system - they have been replaced by inmates (who are to be considered a lower form of primate). Prisons and penitentiaries have been replaced by Correctional Centers and facilities (but no one can define what they are "correcting"). Wardens have been replaced by Superintendents (why "super" and not just "intendents"?). Turnkeys, screws, and prison guards have been replaced by "correctional officers" (once again, what are they correcting?).

The list goes on ad nauseam infinitum, but what does it all mean? Well it's pureed greed plain and simple, so soft and subtle the spoon fed general public doesn't get sick and throw up and off the abusive chains of statism and socialism combined. And it's not just the Criminal Justice System (another oxymoron), it's society as a whole. It's the daily bread we feed our kith and kin to explain away the separation of freemen and criminals, the powerful and the powerless, rich and poor people of all color and natural origin, until what used to be an aberration becomes "normal" daily fare - and therein lie the lies of "freedom from aggression".

I challenge everyone to open both eyes and ears. Question what you see and hear every day every hour, and determine the original "behind the scenes" reason for what you're hearing and seeing. If you can't determine the cause of the effect, wave the smoke from your mirrors and look again. It's all before your very eyes.



Return to Port Of Call Home Page
Return to June/July 2002 Table of Contents