(ANTIMEDIA) Op-Ed — Schools still misteach that America was discovered by Christopher Columbus. Never mind that people were already here or that Columbus never actually set foot onto North America. America did not exist until Columbus and other Europeans began sniffing around is the story the government teaches us; Columbus is touted as a hero, diluting the genocide and violence against indigenous peoples that European settler’s used to colonize this land. On and on unwinds the yarn of falsities disguised as history in America.
For those who are questioning everything and deconstructing truth from utter bullshit, you may or may not know that 30 years ago today, the Philadelphia Police Department dropped a bomb on a west Philly neighborhood.
“Whoa!” Right? Dropping bombs in neighborhoods is what terrorists do. Not the good ole police. The Philadelphia Police were targeting MOVE, a Philly-based radical movement dedicated to black liberation. Six adults and five children died, a neighborhood burned, 65 homes were destroyed and 250 people were left homeless. What happened on May 13, 1985 is one of America’s worst known cases of police brutality.
30 years ago. May 13, 1985, America bombed its own neighborhood and killed 11 Afrikans. #MOVE #movebombing pic.twitter.com/UI165donDt
— Axiomist (@hakilitigi) May 13, 2015
Why is it important to acknowledge and understand the MOVE bombing? Journalist, Mumia Abu-Jamal, who reported extensively on MOVE and is now serving time for killing a cop that he says he did not kill, puts it best:
“May 13th at 30, why should we care what happened on May 13th, 1985? I mean, seriously, that was 30 years ago, a long time ago, way back when. Know what I mean? Most people won’t say that, but they think that. Why, indeed? I’ll tell you why. Because what happened then is a harbinger of what’s happening now all across America. I don’t mean bombing people—not yet, that is. I mean the visceral hatreds and violent contempt once held for MOVE is now visited upon average people, not just radicals and revolutionaries like MOVE. In May 1985, police officials justified the vicious attacks on MOVE children by saying they, too, were combatants. In Ferguson, Missouri, as police and National Guard confronted citizens, guess how cops described them in their own files. “Enemies.” Enemy combatants, anyone?
Then look at 12-year-old Tamir Rice of Cleveland. Boys, men, girls, women—it doesn’t matter. When many people stood in silence, or worse, in bitter acquiescence, to the bombing, shooting and carnage of May 13, 1985, upon MOVE, they opened the door to the ugliness of today’s police terrorism from coast to coast. There is a direct line from then to now. May 13, 1985, led to the eerie robocop present. If it had been justly and widely condemned then, there would be no now, no Ferguson, no South Carolina, no Los Angeles, no Baltimore. The barbaric police bombing of May 13, 1985, and the whitewash of the murders of 11 MOVE men, women and children opened a door that still has not been closed. We are today living with those consequences. From imprisoned nation, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.”
“Drop a bomb on a residential area? I never in my life heard of that,” a neighborhood resident told a reporter on May 13, 1985. “It’s like Vietnam.” For a deeper look at our history lest we be destined to repeat it like we have been doing for the past century, check out: A Basic History of the 1985 MOVE Bombing, MOVE Bombing at 30: “Barbaric” 1985 Philadelphia Police Attack Killed 11 & Burned a Neighborhood, I’m From Philly. 30 Years Later, I’m Still Trying To Make Sense Of The MOVE Bombing. Please feel free to utilize the comments to share information.
This article (Remember When the Police Dropped a Bomb on a Neighborhood in Philly? Me Neither) is an opinion editorial (OP-ED). The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the views of Anti-Media. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to the author and TheAntiMedia.org. Tune in! The Anti-Media radio show airs Monday through Friday @ 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. Help us fix our typos: [email protected].
Let’s make note that MOVE was a black power, communist,and Anarcho-primitivism group. I’m not trying to dismiss the Philly police for dropping bombs (wtf), but I don’t think MOVE should be glorified because of the bombing.
You say “black power, communist,and Anarcho-primitivism group”, I see people fighting for (their) freedom.
Is it a crime to be a communist or anarchist? NO! And I don’t see how “black power” can be an argument here.
You might want to start think (or if you think you do, start thinking critically please! Because I can tell you, you’re not!).
What is the KKK, Aryan Nation and other groups that ABSOLUTELY nothing happens too who actively engage in criminal activities…..not just rhetoric?
You are a white woman in white America. White people don’t get BOMBED! You are not living in the real world…. only on “9/11” were white people,white Americans bombed, only because the government wanted that way.Wake up lady: whites only cry when whites get bombed. This should when then gets together, guess you’ll cry then.
Those are all terms used to trigger you to think “oh it must have been justified,” they were black power communists etc.
The simple fact that your first thought about this wasn’t the horror shows how brainwashed you are.
Neuro linguistic programming look it up
Nixon’s war on drugs was deliberately to target blacks. They have been victimized far more than most Americans even realize. Yes we have all been victimized by our tyrannical govt but blacks are targeted and not acknowledging that to me is just putting a further divide between races. We must come together and realize we have the same enemy.
Another fun fact left out of our history books was Irish slavery. King James sold my Irish ancestors to the colonists before the revolutionary war as he owned Ireland. They left that part out to once again divide us. This country was founded on greed slavery & genocide. Democracy capitalism and a “Christian nation,” are a joke. We are all slaves. Slavery has never ended it was just modernized.
The constitution was flawed and they stopped going by that in 1913. That’s when debt slavery began.
Did you know slavery isn’t illegal?
It’s UNLAWFUL. See how fucked up that is?
What about all the weapons that the Move members had? What about the neighbors they were torturing?
I do absolutely agree that bombing Osage ave was not the right thing to do. Being glued to the tv that day, i was shocked and appalled.
But as for Mumia? He murdered Officer Danny Faulkner. If you lived in Philly in the 80’s you would know better.
Something wrong with black power, communism, or anarcho-primitivism? I’ll take any or all over the racist corporate financial state I live in today.