The outsider perspective

I have been reading article upon article upon article about Camden, but what I've really been paying attention to are the comments. People may not want to go into the city of Camden, but they sure have a lot to say about it.

Some comments are absolutely infuriating: You could put 10,000 cops in that city it won't help. Mayor Redd get those guns working on the USS New Jersey point them at the city and open fire!!!!!

Others actually almost seem to understand the complexities of the problems in Camden and approach with more compassion and sympathy: Camden is not a cesspool. There are good hard working people that live here. People who just want to raise their kids or live out their retirement years in peace. The real issue in Camden; and the other cities you mentioned, is poverty. 

Or this one: The primary cause of Camden’s problem, if people listened to the videos, is that the poor population kept getting poorer and growing in size while the wealthy kept getting wealthier. This is the same scenario as the whole nation is beginning to experience. We could use this as a good Blue Print of what America in general will be from sea to shining sea if thing are not done to protect ALL AMERICANS not just the Wealthy. 

I have been saturating myself with these comments, coping them into a Microsoft Word doc, and have collected over 60 pages of them. 

For the next meeting with my participants, I want to focus on these comments. My mentor suggested that I may have taken them as far as we can go with discussions and that now would be a good time to push them out of the apathy I sometimes sense from them, make them angry and make them deal with that anger, and do some theatre that will help us all get to that more vulnerable place that not only creates great drama, but moves us closer to healing.