In this clip, a CNN camera catches an exchange between a protesting Baltimore veteran and a police officer, as the former Marine passionately laments the change in attitudes and perceptions between being a Marine and as a citizen of Baltimore.
“Is this what it’s coming to man? I love this f*cking country just as much as you! I was gonna give my life for this country, man! Look at this community now!”
The CNN reporter catches up to him and asks him, in an astonishing show of condescension, why he might possibly be so emotional. He looks incredulously at the row of riot cops as evidence of the black American’s disenfranchisement from the rest of society. “We got to stop being pacified every time they throw us a bone where they want us to calm down, man. We need to wait for the end result to come in,” he replied to a question about the charges being filed against the cops, as if that resolved the issue.
He then explodes: “When I was in the Marine Corps, they called me a ‘patriot.’ A marine. But now that I’m fighting for my people they call me a f*cking ‘thug.’ They called me a ‘thug’ when I fight for my people!”
It’s a moving speech and it really highlights the way we hold our armed forces up on a pedestal and but forget all about them when they return to civilian life. The demoralizing of the Baltimore protesters by the media is just another cog in the racist, repressive machine that keeps the inner cities down while America reaps millions off their suffering.
Watch it here: