See, liberals know it all; they know what public transportation you should be using, the appropriate size of your house, what schools you should be forced to attend, how many calories your meals should be, what seat belt you should strap on, what your sodium intake should be, etc..... I should know because I used to believe I knew it all.
But none of that means my world view doesn't pose ethical/moral challenges to my thinking.
This is great instance...........
Dexter Burroughs was going to attend Cincinnati State and Technical College after being accepted into the surgical tech program.
But that plan will never be.
In death, Burroughs' purpose could be to shut down Club Ritz or possibly create a citywide policy where a homicide at a bar would shutter a venue for good.Burroughs, 21, who grew up in Kennedy Heights, was gunned down inside Club Ritz in the early morning hours of May 16 after a confrontation with the shooter. Roughly 700 people were inside the club. Still, the gunman - described as a young black man wearing a red shirt - was able to escape the club and elude police.
The shooting death is the second inside the bar since 1998. There have been multiple shootings outside the bar, including three on Valentine's Day.
Peggy Burroughs stood above her son's casket and clung tightly to the lectern late Tuesday morning.
Raising her bowed head, she looked into a sea of more than 300 mourners at Avondale's Zion Baptist Church and said her son's death needs a purpose.
"There's going to be a purpose," she repeated a few times.
Burroughs' father, Ehling Burroughs, has been staging a protest outside the club since his son was killed. He's put up posters on the windows and has renamed the club as "Club Homicide."
About 10,000 signatures have been collected calling for the club to be closed for good, Hope Dudley said. Dudley created the petitions and even addressed City Council about Club Ritz back in February. On Sunday, she went to the club and spoke to Burroughs' father.
Now here's the dilemma. As a libertarian, I think the owner of this club should be able to keep working his club as he sees fit. After all, the 700+ people who were in that club all knew the risks of this place. The gansta reputation is what attracts people to the joint. Dexter Burroughs knew this when he went into the place that night. You won't see old Gordon in this place because I know everyone in there is a walking target.
But this belief is at odds with my belief that a local community should be allowed to "police it own". After all, if I had a property next to this place, I'm suffering in real economic loss by having the OK Corral (without the charm) right next door.
In addition, if this place closes, the thugocracy that graces this club at night is just going to migrate somewhere else creating a whole new public hazard.
I'd be interested in others thought on this issue. Should the community be allowed to close this club and why? What about the owner of this business, who simply provides the community what they want and he has 700 customers to prove it?
I wonder what T.I. thinks?
On a semi-related note, if a newspaper is going to make someone out to be an innocent bystander, try not to use a mug shot as the photo in the article.
2 comments:
The whole arguement is a logical fallacy. Dexter was not killed because of the Club's reputation or target demographic, he was killed because someone decided to bring a gun and shoot him.
Club Ritz may draw crowds of gangbangers and thugs, but unless someone is infringing upon the rights of others, there is no violation of law/principle--only speculation and stereotyping.
Using the same logic, you could argue that the Gulf of Mexico is at fault for the BP Oil Spill because there is oil under the ocean floor and it attracted oil companies and something bad eventually happened, which of course makes absolutely no sense.
In the end, Club Ritz is being punished economically already as they are recieving negative press and will ultimately end up losing revenues and profits from the whole ordeal. Having customers getting killed isn't neccessarily good for business.
You want a purpose? How about having the community come out and say enough is enough. 700 people in the club and no one is calling Crimebusters to bring a murderer to justice? What you have is a cultural problem, which you alluded to by the riff-raff migrating to other places and causing trouble.
-Jeremy
If Ritz broke some law, shut them down. If they abide the law, they have every right to exist.
I find it incredibly ironic that in that part of town, city government is trying to force this business to shut down, while at the same time trying to force another business (Kroger) to stay open. I think we would be better off if the city schools would stop trying to micro-manage businesses and worry more about teaching responsible household finance while the kids are young. I guarantee that if the people in that part of town had the right financial management tools and applied them to their day-to-day lives there would be more Krogers and fewer Ritzes. And city government would not have to force it.
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