Flashback to 1967...

I remember the riots that happened in 1967. My family was driving back from visiting relatives in Canada. I can't remember alot of details from the vacation except for losing a tooth while eating corn on the cob in a restaurant and causing quite a scene over it and driving thru Detroit. I can't tell you at what points the riots were at, except I believe it was still before it spread to Toledo. I remember seeing smoke, and hearing fear in my mother's voice as she discussed with my father whether we should even drive thru Detroit. You didn't hear alot else about it, except I knew that there had also been some rioting in Toledo. Adults would talk about it in hushed tones, stopping when one of us came into the room.

All I knew for sure was some mysterious "They" had destroyed alot of places in Detroit and some in Toledo and that people had died. That no one could understand why "They" would do something like that. That we were lucky that "They" didn't try to kill us all.

While I can't claim to be a fan of Mayor Jack Ford, his trying to address the rioters or unruly crowd whichever term you prefer did take some bravery. Others in the past have tried to do as he did in similar situations and sometimes? Ended up with the same result, from Detroit in 1967:

Early on the first day of the rebellion, Hubert Locke, a Black administrative assistant to Detroit's police commissioner, called together several of the city's Responsible Negro Leaders. In pairs, they fanned out through the Tenth Precinct to plead with the crowds to disperse. One pair comprised Deputy School Superintendent Arthur Johnson and U.S. Representative John Conyers, Jr., who was quite popular among his constituents.

At one intersection, Conyers stood on the hood of the car and shouted through a bullhorn, "We're with you! But, please! This is not the way to do things! Please go back to your homes!" "No, no, no," the crowd chanted, "Don't want to hear it!" "Uncle Tom!" One man in the crowd, a civil rights activist whom Conyers had once defended in a trial, was inciting the crowd and shouting at Conyers, "Why are you defending the cops and the establishment? You're just as bad as they are!" Rocks and bottles flew toward the car, one of them hitting a cop nearby. The crowd was getting "uglier." Johnson whispered into Conyers' ear, "John, let's get the hell out of here." As Conyers climbed down from the hood of the car, he remarked to a reporter in disgust, "You try to talk to those people and they'll knock you into the middle of next year."

I don't agree with those who claim it is only blacks who fall prey to this mob mindset that causes riots. We've seen it happen after sports events both pro and college, in the Middle East and various spots of the world just in recent years. What most of these situations share though is the desire to rise up against the "establishment", it's a common theme even in some of the riots in college towns where drunken students fight the police and burn couches in bonfires. There is at times in most of us a certain resentment we feel and it would appear that during situations like this when a mob gets out of control, people that would normally never join in violence have this desire to "get their licks in". It would also seem that are are always a few who go there with the specific intent to cause violence. T

In history there have been riots that have caused great change in nations, I don't believe our riot here in Toledo is one of those. It did however demonstrate that all it really takes is a few people to start throwing stones to cause logic to disappear. I don't think there will ever come a time when mob mentality no longer exists, all we can do is try to prevent it best we can and when it does happen? End it as quickly as possible hoping for no bloodshed. Do I believe given this that those who are arrested should not be punished to the full extent of the law? No, because perhaps next time a few extra seconds of thought about "Do I really want to be arrested?" might prevent someone from joining in should this ever happen again.