The late Amiri Baraka, a Newark native and New Jersey poet laureate, acknowledged that he knew little about the fate of America’s ethnic working classes. In his 1984 memoir, The Autobiography of Leroi Jones, Baraka said of the white kids he lived among, “I often wonder what these guys and girls carried away from that experience with us and what they make of it.”
As he has made abundantly clear in these past few years, Baraka’s son, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, cares no more about those guys and girls than the media do. This past week, Mayor Baraka was busy unveiling a 700-pound statue of career felon George Floyd whose death in police custody made him an international sensation. The mayor said, “Hopefully when people walk by and they see it, and they participate, hopefully it inspires them to become active in the struggles that are happening right here in Newark and right here in New Jersey.”
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