Comments on: Is This Black Expo?

By: seether

seether — Fri, 04 Aug 2006 00:56:05 +0000

there was reportedly 2 rapes that occured,
it was told 9 men grabbed a girl and dragged her into a alley where they raped her,
for 4 people to be shot at indianapolis black expo shows how much of a dangerous event it is,how many people are shot at gen con? or at a starwars convention?,

its way out of control,
they shouldn’t hold it in city streets,why isn’t it held at the indiana state fairgrounds?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 18:35:01 +0000

you’re assuming these kids are products of public schools. That migiht be an unfair assumption.

By: b

Wed, 02 Aug 2006 14:51:37 +0000

What is most scarey to me is that the people in the video represent the future of our country. How can our nation survive with public school system that churns out masses of uneducated kids?

By: WriteJoyce Rogers

WriteJoyce Rogers — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 14:10:05 +0000

Yeah, I have attended several Expos over the years. This year’s post-curfew youth crowd was particularly unruly. It hurt an otherwise great ten-dya run of IBE. IBE has a national reputation for programming, year-round, and they don’t need this kind of publicity.

I guess we could pray for rain. But that would just shove this crap inside the mall, and they don’t want to deal with it.

Charles was a great guy…he was, let’s just say, creative at getting businesses to support Expo. This year’s event tried very hard to draw in the literary and art crowd, as well as the flea market types at the Expo Hall. But you’re right–if it’s on their stage, or in their venues, they must take responsibililty for it.

The video Abdul has posted, is probably accurate. It looks like about 20% of the video was shot inside a venue of some kind. The rest was on the streets. Technically, Black Expo doesn’t control that.

I wrote Ms. Rogers, president of IBE, and she responded with a very thoughtful e-mail. They want to plan events kids will attend, and there are going to be some forums soon to address that. She openly invited me, and I’m sure that would extend to anyone else.

I didn’t see anyone in the video who looked poor, homeless or down on their luck. I saw expensive clothes and jewelry, shoes, etc., and at this age, that often comes, at leas tin part, from parents. (By the way, when did this trend of gold teeth enter the picture? Who has that kind of money? Where are the parents to stop this waste? Is it that in-style to look thuggish, to the extent you spend thousands on your mouth?)

If parents are dishing out the money to buy these things, and, in many cases, travelling to Indy for a weekend of fun, why the hell can’t they supervise their kids, instead of turning them loose until all hours?

Because it’s easier to turn them loose.

Write Ms. Rogers: jrogers@ibe.org. She’s a talented lady who wants to solve this problem. IBE is getting tagged with the blame, even though they aren’t totally to blame. The problem can be solved, if we have the will.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 02:45:28 +0000

Well you apparently haven’t been to many Black Expos have you? My first experience was about 15 years ago (give or take a year). I sat in a room filled with young children who had been brought to the Expo on buses to listen to Tupac. The perimeter and doors were manned by Black Muslim ‘guards’ while M…X something or another took the stage and spewed the most race-filled hatred I have ever heard in my life! I’m white and grew up in the burbs with neighbors who belonged to the KKK…so I’ve heard some hatred in my days but never the language I heard that day…very clear calls to kill whites. X was joined by Tupac (the kids’ hero) who joined in the message of hate. This was filmed by one of the local stations. I walked out.
I believe this was also the year that Joe Jackson was honored as ‘Father of the Year’. Can you imagine? And this was AFTER revelation of his child-rearing skills – NOT!

Rev. Charles was in charge then so let’s be careful about putting him on too high a pedestal.

Expo people can’t be held accountable for everything people do in the streets but they can be accountable for who they put on stage and who they select to honor.

By: ParentalVoid

ParentalVoid — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 18:32:24 +0000

The mouthy thug from Brooklyn was pretty typical from what I saw during the weekend Expo crowd.

Where are the parents? This kid said he was here with his family. Did they know he was out on a street corner, loitering, spewing hate and nonsense?

This trend has been growing for years. It keeps people away from downtown during Expo weekends.
The mouths on these kids.

In nine minutes, I saw every urban stereotype confirmed. In triplicate.