February 26, 2006
Baltimore Tackles 'Stop Snitching' Movement
We don't often report on the happenings of our neighbor to the north, Baltimore. But the picture above -- which I snapped on the Orange Line on Friday night -- reflects a sentiment and phenomenon that has plagued Baltimore in recent years and has been receiving national billing since.
This week's Time features an article on the 'Stop Snitching' movement that has swept Baltimore's rough-and-tumble neighborhoods, and has thus far complicated the efforts of the city's police to crack down on crime. The article reads:
Few cities have it quite as bad as Baltimore. The city's highest-crime areas tend to be close-knit, insular communities where everybody knows everybody else's business, including who's talking to the police. Mix in a high-stakes drug trade and a flood of handguns, and you have a recipe for a pitiless war on witnesses. Baltimore's problems first made national news in 2002 when a family of seven were killed in an arson attack after they helped police identify drug dealers in their neighborhood. The climate of fear has only worsened since then. In 2004 it even got a slogan--Stop Snitching--with the appearance of an underground DVD with that title.The District doesn't seem to suffer from the same phenomenon, but it's not a stretch to assume that it's likely bubbling beneath the surface. Crime has been on the rise since last year, and the police department's work in closing cases would no doubt be complicated if witness intimidation became a larger problem than it currently is. The District's crime has migrated northwards out of the city, so might we soon see the 'Stop Snitching' movement making its way down?
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Too late...it's already here. I've seen several versions of the "stop snitchin" t-shirt in Petworth.
Too late...it's already here. I've seen several versions of the "stop snitchin" t-shirt in Petworth.
I have a few pictures I still need to download to Flickr, but in our friends' B'more neighborhood (Federal Hill), the anti-snitchers haven't done so well in spelling. Most, if not all, of the tags I came across say "Stop Sniching..." (insert favorite expletive at the end there).
Yeah I got one of these scrawled on my door after I turned my neighbor in to the S.E.C. for reporting falsified revenues for the Third Quarter of last year. After I started finding my Wall Street Journal shreaded each morning, I totally clammed up. Those white-collar thugs DO NOT mess around.
As a resident of Baltimore I can attest to the fact that this city is getting OUT OF HAND when it comes to crime,drugs, etc. Ferderal Hill, Mt. Vernon, & Fells Point begin some of the "nicer" neighborhoods are even getting bad. Hell, it's even bleeding out to the suburbs like Owings Mills and Towson. "Stop Snitching" is a small part of an ENORMOUS problem. It's no suprise that "Stop Snitching" is becoming a street catch phrase scrawled on metro seats, because when they really mean it in your neighborhood, you'll know it. Also, to say that the Baltimore PD is "cracking down" on anything is way off the mark. The Baltimore PD has no idea how to handle this situation, let alone act in a professional, civil manner. We just had 2 officers indicted for committing first-degree rape, conspiracy to violate the rape laws and misconduct in the office when they brought female "suspects" back to the station and told them they needed have sex with them or else they would be charged with drug posession. Also, the city's 2005 crime statistics are being questioned after news leaked that the police department upholds an "internal policy" that if a crime cannot be solved, a report will NOT be taken. Unbelievable! Baltimore's Central Booking held an average of 1,500 "suspects" PER MONTH in 2005, with only 1 in 15 ever being charged with a crime! Baltimore's policy, just keep arresting and we'll eventually catch someone for something. This is how snitching became an innocent person's last vestige. Either snitch or run the risk of being framed by dirty cops.
As a resident of Baltimore I can attest to the fact that this city is getting OUT OF HAND when it comes to crime,drugs, etc. Ferderal Hill, Mt. Vernon, & Fells Point begin some of the "nicer" neighborhoods are even getting bad. Hell, it's even bleeding out to the suburbs like Owings Mills and Towson. "Stop Snitching" is a small part of an ENORMOUS problem. It's no suprise that "Stop Snitching" is becoming a street catch phrase scrawled on metro seats, because when they really mean it in your neighborhood, you'll know it. Also, to say that the Baltimore PD is "cracking down" on anything is way off the mark. The Baltimore PD has no idea how to handle this situation, let alone act in a professional, civil manner. We just had 2 officers indicted for committing first-degree rape, conspiracy to violate the rape laws and misconduct in the office when they brought female "suspects" back to the station and told them they needed have sex with them or else they would be charged with drug posession. Also, the city's 2005 crime statistics are being questioned after news leaked that the police department upholds an "internal policy" that if a crime cannot be solved, a report will NOT be taken. Unbelievable! Baltimore's Central Booking held an average of 1,500 "suspects" PER MONTH in 2005, with only 1 in 15 ever being charged with a crime! Baltimore's policy, just keep arresting and we'll eventually catch someone for something. This is how snitching became an innocent person's last vestige. Either snitch or run the risk of being framed by dirty cops.
I've seen this pointed out before (on Slate, perhaps) but the problem might just be that the police have created a system that is too reliant on people "turning coat" instead of gathering evidence and old fashioned on-the-street beat work (and knowing the community). instead, the plan seems to be to just grab someone on a lesser charge -- jaywalking, mayhaps -- and then browbeat them with scare tactics into "snitching." this idea is maybe finally backfiring.
I saw a 60-some year old woman in Elyria, Ohio wearing a "Stop Snitching" tee. Highest of high comedy.
I agree with alot of what has been said here, as a Baltimore resident I have seen this as well. As "Baltimore Lawyer" and "DC1974" mentioned, the police are having little to no effect on this, without snitchers they probably have little to go on. Perhaps we need a "Keep Snitching" movement, the way I see it the snitching is good, but it will get you killed on the street. I don't know who to be afraid of more, the police or the criminals, because if you run into either of them in this city - you are in trouble.
I saw someone wearing a Stop Snitching t-shirt at 8th and H NE a few weeks ago.
I saw a stop snitching shirt on a college student in Greenville, SC last semester. She wound up dropping the intro engineering class she was in.
Man, it's already in the District. It's just too cold to sport the stupid t-shirts so they're covered with North Face jackets for the winter. Just wait until the spring.
And don't forget that NBA player Carmelo Anthony was in that Stop Snitching DVD.
oops, hit post before I meant to. Carmelo's job is his credit, also.
Yes, but are you all comcerned about people wearing effing t-shirts or the state of the community that surrounds these people?
I don't care if someone on 8th and H was wearing one, soon you'll probably see these shirts for sale at the mall...just like the stupid snowman shirts.
It's not a matter of who's wearing them or where, that part is meaningless now.
This conversation is silly. You might as well talk about Ozzy worshiping satan or Bevis and Butthead causing kids to hit each other or any number of things that have spun out of pop culture that were supposed to have a negative influence on our kids and society - and now we laugh at and say "wow, we were dumb to worry about {a t-shirt}"
Worry about the crime stats in your neighborhood and demand something be done about that...if scumbags are taken off the streets, who cares what their t-shirt says.
Good point about the Ozzy shirts, Who, but can you not recognize that faddy as this thing is, it could also represent and reinforce the self-destructive culture of these neighborhoods. Look back to the crack epidemic days, good people were trapped by fear in their own homes due to the bullying attitudes of the few thugs who profited (slightly) from the drug trade. Messages like this can have an effect on people. I don't think that effect is carried forward when white kids start wearing them (and it may even weaken the message), but as long as this message is passed among the neighbors in troubled neighborhoods, it can matter.
I agree, "I Love to Cuddle" or "Unicorn Power!" might be friendlier shirts than "Stop Snitching" And unfortunately, "Stop Snitching" is a policy in the ghetto, not just a t-shirt catch phrase. I was simply annoyed at the turn this conversation was taking twords "sightings" of these shirts.
I live in Baltimore, I drive through several rough areas on a regular basis and I have never seen one of these shirts. (Similar to the old teaching addage: Those who can't thug, make t-shirts about thugging...and then wear them at the mall)
Sadly, even with a t-shirt to eventually water down the message, the Baltimore/DC drug trade and crime activity is not going to get any better. (see above conversations)
Every one should be more concerned about reducing crime than these shirts.
*Pop culture will make the shirts disappear, but what about the crime?*
I agree, "I Love to Cuddle" or "Unicorn Power!" might be friendlier shirts than "Stop Snitching" And unfortunately, "Stop Snitching" is a policy in the ghetto, not just a t-shirt catch phrase. I was simply annoyed at the turn this conversation was taking twords "sightings" of these shirts.
I live in Baltimore, I drive through several rough areas on a regular basis and I have never seen one of these shirts. (Similar to the old teaching addage: Those who can't thug, make t-shirts about thugging...and then wear them at the mall)
Sadly, even with a t-shirt to eventually water down the message, the Baltimore/DC drug trade and crime activity is not going to get any better. (see above conversations)
Every one should be more concerned about reducing crime than these shirts.
*Pop culture will make the shirts disappear, but what about the crime?*
I agree, "I Love to Cuddle" or "Unicorn Power!" might be friendlier shirts than "Stop Snitching" And unfortunately, "Stop Snitching" is a policy in the ghetto, not just a t-shirt catch phrase. I was simply annoyed at the turn this conversation was taking twords "sightings" of these shirts.
I live in Baltimore, I drive through several rough areas on a regular basis and I have never seen one of these shirts. (Similar to the old teaching addage: Those who can't thug, make t-shirts about thugging...and then wear them at the mall)
Sadly, even with a t-shirt to eventually water down the message, the Baltimore/DC drug trade and crime activity is not going to get any better. (see above conversations)
Every one should be more concerned about reducing crime than these shirts.
*Pop culture will make the shirts disappear, but what about the crime?*
oops
I'm considering running for office in Maryland on a local level in that state and will consider outlawing all of Stop Snitchin products including the shirts, cds, DVD's, literature, and so forth.
The African-American community cannot be suckers in 2007!! We know that it is the criminal element that has perpetuated this "Stop Snitchin'" phenomenon. Law and order are ordained of God (as you understand God)to keep order. If one witnesses a crime against ones fellow neighbors and does not eradicate the criminal, how long will it be before the criminal perpetuates his offensive behavior against the original observer? In other words, if you see your homie rob Ms Jenkins down the street and you don't feel it necessary to check your homie, it won;t be long before your homie (or someone else's homie robs YOUR aunt, grandmother, nother or sister!