It has been a sick experiment to watch, but the continued denials about the nature of the big, violent fight in downtown Cincinnati recently, in attempting to show that it was a racist incident, and that the white people had it coming, was the attitude.  While just a few blocks to the north in Over-the-Rhine, there were back-to-back killings in an area that Cincinnati has been trying to reform for years into an economic zone.  The shootings on one night, just a few days after the music festival fight at 3 in the morning, involved one guy, 35 years old, who was shot to death in his car just north of Liberty Street by a person in the car with him.  He was shot in the chest, head, and other places violently by a shooter dressed all in black who left the scene.  The next night, a young woman, 34, was shot many times in the back by someone shooting out of a car in a particular direction, just a very short distance away from the previous shooting.  Police say it was an accident, that she was not the intended target.  The shooter was shooting at someone else and accidently hit her.  She was shot 15 to 20 times, which is an awful lot for an accident.  But these shootings received very little national attention because they were all people of color killing each other.  But they display a much bigger problem that has been brewing in the background for many years, and is the reason that President Trump has federalized the police in Washington D.C.  Many cities are suffering through this problem and Cincinnati has been getting national coverage for how poorly race relations are in a town that is supposed to be ideal throughout the nation.  This is a much bigger problem than the fight that has received so much coverage, and there has been an attempt by many involved to justify it.  The bar is so low because of the mass killings that go underreported, that if people live through a brawl like we witnessed, the expectation is that everyone should be thankful.

The two killings point to a much more violent Over-the-Rhine than the City of Cincinnati wants to advertise.  However, that is nothing new; I have warned many people over the years about the dangers of creating an enterprise zone in that region to provide economic stimulus.  I have informed two mayors and many other politicians over the years about the risks of redeveloping Over-the-Rhine into a commercial millennial hotspot, comparing it to Jurassic Park.  The dinosaurs will eat you; they can’t be kept in a cage on adjacent streets to Vine Street, as it runs through Over-the-Rhine.  That’s what I would say to everyone I described the situation to.  And it wasn’t a skin color kind of thing; it was behavior acceptance, and I would know well.  I used to buy my car tires from a place that would change them on Liberty Street, right in the vicinity of these recent shootings.  I used to do a lot of rough work, and I drove a kind of tank that always had its tires destroyed because I would frequently enter rough neighborhoods. As a result, I would buy $5 used tires all the time.  My perspective was not one of isolation, looking at everything from the suburbs.  I spent a lot of time in the belly of the beast, and when I say that the people there are like dinosaurs, that is to say that they behave like animals hungry for the destruction of other people with a kind of mindless violence that erupts suddenly and brutally.  It’s almost amusing to watch the nightly news attempt to humanize these stories, making them more relatable to people not living in Over-the-Rhine. 

I have a couple of daughters, and would hear their stories and stories of all their friends who enjoyed the mystery and rawness of visiting OTR as it was sold to the world as an enterprise zone, hoping to lure young millennials to come downtown to see their many restaurants and microbreweries.  I would tell them that if they had to go, they should ensure they carried their guns.  One of my daughters practically lived in the OTR for a few years, and she always took her weapon, and it’s probably the only reason she has survived all those visits.  Police have managed to keep Vine Street somewhat reasonable regarding crime up to Liberty Street, then over to Findlay Market, and Music Hall.  However, I know many people who have tried to go to the OTR to socialize with other hipsters, and they have had many horrible experiences.  I warned my daughters, and eventually they understood my concern; the idealism of youth wore away as they realized the harsh reality that everyone else was facing.  The dinosaurs will eat you if you go into the OTR.  Most people feel lucky to come away from the OTR with just a car that occasionally has its windows knocked out, and carjackings or theft would happen all the time.  Because of the political sentiment at the time for white people to prove they weren’t racist and would be happy to socialize with black people in Over-the-Rhine, people would take the risk to visit as an almost thrill to survive.  It was more exciting than just going somewhere in the suburbs and having drinks with friends.  Because going to the OTR proved that white people weren’t racist to black people, even if in proving it, they risked their lives. 

The truth of the matter is that many of the people who have caused the problem have attempted to introduce dangerous enterprise zones into these communities without changing their behavior.  And the police know who’s in charge.  The police likely know everything about those two shooting cases mentioned, but they don’t want targets on their backs, so they leave the shootings unresolved.  Likely, they were both gang-related and or drug-related directly.  And police have no prospect of getting control.  The unions don’t want the trouble.  Recruiting is horrendous because nobody wants the job.  And the political characters are unsupportive and wholly disconnected from reality.  Investors were suckered into proving they weren’t racist by investing in businesses along Vine Street north of Central Parkway, only to realize that the violence loomed just a few blocks over on all sides, especially north of Liberty Street.  As a dare, I once walked up Vine Street at 2 AM from Central Parkway to McMillan Street on the University of Cincinnati campus, and from what I saw, there is no saving the people in that region without a significant behavioral change.  Crime ran the zone, and no amount of love from people moving in and proving they weren’t racist by living alongside people barely able to function as animals changed anything.  Crime goes underreported, even mass killings, because everyone wants to believe they can tame the dinosaurs.  And they can’t.  The dinosaurs will eat anybody they want, any time, and in any place.  And that’s the kind of attitude that was confronted on the streets of downtown Cincinnati after that music festival.  There is an entitlement to violence that is validated every time some gang kills someone in Over-the-Rhine, and that level of violence has been accepted.  Because liberal society doesn’t want to admit to itself just how bad it is, it wants to believe that reform is possible.  And it isn’t.  Only law and order will work, and that starts by kicking in the doors to the people who did these killings and arresting them, prosecuting them, and probably giving them the death penalty.  Because anything less, they don’t and won’t respect.  They reside in the shadows of the night, awaiting more politicians to lure innocent people into their neighborhood to rob and pillage ruthlessly.  And they have nothing to fear, because they don’t fear anything, especially the law.  When people ask me why my carry gun is a Desert Eagle .50 caliber, I have a lot of experience in those kinds of neighborhoods.  And it’s the only thing they understand.  The only law they obey.  And it is the only way that reform in those crime zones can bring about peace.  All the police and politicians know it, but nobody dares say it.  And that’s why the crime continues.

Rich Hoffman

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