It seems as if we Clevelanders never learn. One would think that after the racial animosities that were so manifest in the Flats some years ago (and played a significant role in the demise of the East Bank as a viable entertainment district) we would have straightforwardly addressed the root causes of such clashes of cultures and races … but no. Hereabouts we like to stick our collective head in the sand until the next racial flare up, and then we tend to over react out of frustration, anger and bruised feelings.
The most recent racial dustup (over complaints of bias by blacks who frequent the Warehouse District) certainly won’t be the last … unless we learn some lessons from it and address the question of race openly, honestly and without rancor. Now I know that’s a tall order, seeing as how the race question is the Third Rail of civic discourse in Cuyahoga County (and indeed much of America) … no one wants to touch it with a ten-foot pole since the subject makes us so uncomfortable. But address it we must if we are to ever move the city and region forward in a sustained and progressive manner.
In this most recent case (which has been simmering, festering, just waiting to explode for quite a while now) NAACP boss George Forbes alleged that blacks are being mistreated by police and club owners in the Warehouse District. City officials, on the other hand, counter that clubs which cater to young blacks attract a rough clientele that make genteel — and mostly white — suburbanites uncomfortable … and both sides are right to some degree, but only as far as they drill down (which, by the way, isn’t very deep).
What tends to happen in situations like this is… Symptoms only are addressed (often badly), uncomfortable truths are ignored, and root causes go unaddressed. Then, of course, lawsuits are filed. If visitors and patrons to the area are acting out in inappropriate ways (be they black or white) they should be put in check; conversely, if club owners are discriminating against patrons based on the color of their skin, they have to be put in check also. Fair is only fair. The conundrum comes, in part, from the difference in how blacks and whites party.
The problem is (and has been) police too often see black folks partying at a club and immediately think “rioting criminals,” no matter if the patrons are college-educated, middleclass blacks. However, no one in law enforcement views white club owners as potentially committing a crime — which they certainly are doing when they deny equal access based on race.
The solution to this point has been to flood the area around the clubs with overwhelming police presence near closing time and pray for the best. But mark my words, we cannot and will not be able to “police” our way out of what is at root a social problem … not a law enforcement problem.
The real problem is this: Young people are just getting warmed up around 2AM, right around the time the clubs are closing. They still want to party hearty, that’s why it’s so hard to disperse them, to tell them to be good little young people and go home. Hell, back in the day we used to party till daybreak, and I don’t think young people have changed all that much.
We say we want to attract bright, energetic and progressive young people to Greater Cleveland, but we’re not willing to offer them all that much in the form of entertainment. In cities like New York, San Francisco, New Orleans, and yes, even hated South Beach in Miami, young people who work hard all week can party all night on weekends. Even Shakespeare said, “Youth must have its day.”
Now, if there were one or two after-hours clubs in the area for them to go to and discharge the rest of their energy when the clubs close, there would be little acting out in the streets. The young partiers would be in the after-hours clubs instead. I know, I used to be a part owner of one in New York back in the 80s.
And as for young people getting too wild and acting out: The owners of after-hours clubs blackball anyone who caused a problem anywhere in any club. Assholes simply are not allowed back in for a set period of time … and it always, always works. In New York, the worse thing that can happen to a clubber is to get “86ed”, told they can’t come in.
Would it work here? Of course. But would the bluenoses allow such clubs to operate? No way.
We’re simply too provincial (which is another word for “backward”). Instead, we’ll try to “police” our way out of the problem, and in the process kill yet another entertainment district in the process. One thing is for certain: Young blacks are not going to stop going down to the Warehouse District to party. Why should they allow whites to have all of the fun?
From Cool Cleveland correspondent Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com. Frazier’s From Behind The Wall: Commentary on Crime, Punishment, Race and the Underclass by a Prison Inmate is available again in hardback. Snag your copy and have it signed by the author by visiting http://www.frombehindthewall.com.