Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Colin Flaherty, an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in more than 1000 new sites around the world, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and others. His story about a black man unjustly convicted of trying to kill his white girlfriend was featured in the Los Angeles Times and on Court TV and resulted in the release of Kelvin Wiley from state prison. He is a former ghost writer for a Chairman of the US Commission on Civil Rights and author of White Girl Bleed a Lot: The Return of Racial Violence and How the Media Ignore It.
FP: Colin Flaherty, welcome to Frontpage Interview.
Let’s begin with what inspired you to write this book.
Flaherty: Thanks Jamie.
My brother and I were doing a talk radio show in WDEL Wilmington, Delaware when I read a story about something called a flash mob on the streets of Philadelphia. This was two years ago. Then it happened again and again. Finally I looked at it on YouTube, and the violence and mayhem I saw on video was totally different than the antiseptic account I read in the newspapers in Philadelphia. Everyone involved was black. So I asked a few reporters: “What’s up with this race riot in Philadelphia?” They said it was not a race riot and I was imagining things. “Did you see the videos?” I asked. “Well, everyone is black but race has nothing to do with it.”
The riots kept happening, in Philadelphia and elsewhere. I kept asking people what was going on. They kept denying anything was going on.
So I decided I would write a book for the people who denied the reality of this horrific racial violence and mayhem. And that was it: No explanations. No solutions. No apologies. Just that these things are happening all over the country and it cannot be good that so many people are so aggressively denying it.
FP: So what did you discover while writing the book?
Flaherty: I found out almost right away that there are two problems: One, racial violence; and two, liberal reporters and public officials who condone, explain, and even lie about it. I realized the problem was much worse than I, or anyone else thought.
FP: Give us an example of the lies.
Flaherty: Sure, Chicago. Memorial Day 2011. Chicago had been the site of a series of black mob attacks in all different parts of the city. In the downtown, the gay area, the public transportation, and the beaches, to name a few. So during the Memorial Day holiday in 2011, hundreds and hundreds of black people descended on North Avenue Beach and starting beating up people, knocking them off their bikes, wreaking havoc. The next day, the city closed the beach. They said they did it, not because of the mob violence — they denied mob violence even took place there. They said they closed it because it was too hot. A local radio station got the 911 calls, and people who were there called the station, and that showed that the beach was the site of a big civil disturbance, and the police administrators were not telling the truth about it.
FP: Chicago is in the news a lot this year for violence. What kind of job are they doing?
Flaherty: I tell people the following story but I do not expect them to believe it. That is why I put a link to it in the book. So the newly appointed Superintendent of Police is at a meeting and is talking about violence in Chicago and what is responsible. He said Sarah Palin. Just a few weeks ago, he found someone else to blame: The pilgrims. All I can tell you is that I would not have believed it had I not seen it on video. I get a lot of email from police in Chicago. They tell me the same thing others on the front lines all over the country tell me: The situation is very dangerous. And no one knows about it.
FP: How widespread is this problem?
Flaherty: I documented hundreds of examples in more than 70 cities. And here is what happens. I hear about a riot or a mob and I check it out and learn that it was a large group of black people creating havoc. So I write the details. In the course of reporting it, or after the story comes out, I almost always hear: “That’s been happening here a long time.” But reporters are afraid to write about it. City officials are afraid to combat it, or call it by its name. So it goes on. And it is not just the places where you might expect it: Chicago, Philly, Boston, Baltimore. It’s in smaller places in the Midwest as well.
FP: Like where?
Flaherty: Ames, Iowa. They had a “Beat Whitey Night” at the State Fair. Peoria, Illinois. They had almost a dozen episodes of racial violence and lawlessness by black mobs over the last year. Milwaukee. Minneapolis. Seattle. Portland. And on and on.
FP: So what is causing this?
Flaherty: A lot of people in this country are still in a state of denial that these riots and mob lawlessness even exist. So I do not see the point of speculating about cause on something that lots of reporters and political leaders refuse to believe even happen.
Ten years, if we had this conversation, they would have said the same thing: “It’s not happening. You are imagining it.” But today, many of these episodes are on YouTube. And that tells the real story. And part of that story is the reality of the music and video that are a part of their lives. For every horrific example of mob violence and mayhem, there is a popular video by a popular artist glorifying it. Looting, making crack cocaine, killing delivery drivers, beating up white people, rioting and stealing to name a few. These are highly produced, very professional songs and videos by the biggest names in hip hop that sell millions of copies and get millions of views.
FP: What about the press?
Flaherty: The book is about the racial mayhem, but even crazier, is how the press does not cover it. Lots of papers flat out tell you: We are not going to report on the race of criminals. Fair enough. But when it starts happening in mobs, and gets more dangerous, and virtually every mob is the same race, then somebody should be able to figure it that something is happening here. Some newspapers say if you notice the race of the mobs, you are a racist. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch had to discontinue letting people comment on some criminal stories because people were just demanding an answer to the question: “Why is it so important that you hide the race of the people involved?”
FP: And so why is it so important?
Flaherty: We are the most race conscious country on earth. We learn that every day from black caucuses, black teachers groups, black police officers, black public employees, and hundreds of other black groups that are featured so often in local media. With stories that are often written by members of the National Association of Black Journalists. Which is different from other groups of ethnic journalists. Over the last 50 years, they have constructed a paradigm of racial quotas, affirmative action, and race consciousness in almost every part of our society. These riots and lawlessness at least beg the question: How’s that working out for you?
FP: So from these realities, it doesn’t really appear that race relations are getting better.
Flaherty: The gulf between the races is wider and deeper than I thought. The psychiatrists tell us we are only as sick as our secrets. And the biggest secret today is that we are not allowed to talk about black violence in any way that asks people responsible to take responsibility. That has bred a sickness in some black people and some white people — the Aryans, the haters, the Nazis, etc. — that is a lot bigger than I had imagined. Or that most people say.
FP: Crystallize for us why our leftist media, higher literary culture and our public officials condone and deny this racial violence.
Flaherty: The growth of racial violence and lawlessness creates a statement that everything these folks believe and have done over the last 50 years is not just a failure, but is harming the people they think they are helping.
FP: What has been the reaction to your book? Has the Left even acknowledged the existence of your book?
Flaherty: We are getting a tremendous amount of reaction to the book from talk radio, opinion pages and the Internet. Most of it from people who are grateful that finally, someone is talking in a clear and factual and compelling fashion about the topic of black mob violence. Attention from the Left is mixed. The overwhelming reaction is this: In the same breath they deny the widespread racial mayhem exists, then they explain why it exists. But I do get the feeling from many on the Left that the facts are so overwhelming that they are getting tired of standing up in the public square and proposing yet another program they know will not work to solve a problem they do not acknowledge even exists. I think many are ready for a new era of honesty on this topic.
FP: Colin Flaherty, thank you for joining Frontpage Interview.
Flaherty: It is an honor to be featured in a magazine connected to David Horowitz, one of the great intellectual pioneers of our day.
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http://www.boomerspeaks.com/IssueBlackCrime.htm Excerpt: Tonight, around 11 p.m., a group of at least 60-70 African American youth marched down one of the side streets (W. Thrush) to the 4 lane main drag (Sheridan). They were yelling threats to white residents. Things such as we need to kill alll the white people around here. They were physically intimidating anyone calling for help from the police. They were surrounding cars. Cars on the main drag had to slam on their brakes to either avoid the youth blocking not only all four lanes, but a large section of the side street as well. fights were breaking out among them. They were rushing residents who looked out their doors, going on to porches, yelling threats to people calling the police for help. Cars were doing U turns on the streets just to avoid the mob, mostly male. One youth stated his grandfather was white and several assaulted him on the spot. One police officer answered the call. The youth split into two large groups, one heading north, the other south. They were also yelling racial threats to the police officer but he was outnumbered. Another police car did not show up until after the youth finally dispersed and the patty wagon (van) also eventually showed up./