Without Journalists, How Would We Know That Teen Takeovers Are Just Good, Clean Fun for Bored Kids

AP Photo/Evan Vucci

This summer, Washington, D.C. reimposed a curfew on teenagers, limiting how many can gather after 8 p.m. in certain designated areas and requiring them to be off the streets between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m.

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Lefties think that's unfair and racist, as is the criticism of "teen takeovers" that have become a common feature of urban life in some cities. 

The Intercept, a left-wing rag that is a favorite among the radical set, is so lefty and compromised that Glenn Greenwald was forced out of the magazine he helped found for being too critical of Biden. It purports to do fearless investigative journalism; instead, it prints absurd left-wing propaganda, like this. 

One thing that cannot be overstated is the damage caused by inner city policy being set by white liberals who live in the suburbs and get their idea of the world from progressive journalists and nobody else.

If you are a suburban white leftist, please indulge me in a little experiment.

First, read how The Intercept describes this event, and picture it in your mind based off this description. 

Then, watch the videos of the event.

Then extrapolate that to everything you read about, rather than see.

The Intercept's take, driven by hostility to curfews, is that teen takeovers are harmless and the complaints about them are driven by what amounts to a moral panic. Here's how it describes the "overreaction" to an incident at a Chipotle restaurant, which was used as an example of why a curfew was necessary. 

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To some, the scene at the Chipotle represented lawlessness and amplified their fears around the city’s youth. To others, the incident, which police told local media caused no injuries or damage, failed to warrant curfew policies which would increase arrests and police harassment of teenagers, primarily Black teens. 

The neighborhood around the Chipotle is beautiful, said Alex Dodds, “designed as a space where people should come and gather.”

“When Black children do that, they are seen as criminals,” said Dodds, campaign director for Free DC, an organization advocating for the city’s sovereignty that has endorsed Lewis George. “I don’t even understand what we want children to do.” 

A few miles away from McDuffie’s Chipotle press conference, Jeanine Pirro, U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, struck an eerily similar chord to McDuffie. 

“Teen takeovers … have terrorized our neighborhoods,” said the former Fox News host. “They have shut down businesses, and they have wasted hard-earned tax dollars of law-abiding residents who just want to live and work in peace.” 

Federal law enforcement officials would soon begin a “summer surge” targeting teenagers, Pirro warned. She added that her office would begin “aggressively prosecuting parents” whose children violated curfew laws, threatening them with up to six months in prison.    

McDuffie has weaponized the teen gatherings in campaign advertisements and public comments to argue that strict curfew zones — and the tough-on-crime mayoral candidate pushing them — will help forestall more aggressive actions by the Trump administration.

But advocates for D.C. sovereignty and youth in the criminal justice system warned that his rhetoric would only legitimize the administration’s efforts to incarcerate D.C. youth on a large scale, and that there is no evidence teen curfews reduce violent crime. Instead, they say, such curfews would increase the rates of arrest and harassment, particularly of Black teens, at a time when the city is swarming with federal agents. 

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The Intercept's spin is highly sympathetic to the argument that targeting teen takeovers is essentially racist targeting of black teens, who are being oppressed for their skin color. 

Now that you have read its description of what happened at that Chipotle, watch the videos to see whether this investigative journalism publication captured it. 

Diners, including young children, were caught in the middle. The place was smashed up, and even liberals in the city were so fed up that they imposed the curfew, and one of the leading candidates for mayor is running on cracking down. 

Yet Leftists, aping the UK government's idea that suppressing discussion is the real solution to all problems, are angry that people are...angry. (NSFW)

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Because I fucking go to THAT Chipotle! Like that literal one in the video LMAO

This isn't an isolated occurence! Shit like this happens fucking INCESSANTLY here and people literally do not believe me when I describe it

There are fucking Mad Max gangs of forty to fifty 14 year olds on quad bikes that will rove around in packs and try to run down pedestrians. It's like a daily event! It is fucking dire right now!

Don't talk about it because right wingers will weaponize reality!

Now, to be "fair," it is true that enforcing the curfew will result in more arrests of black teens than those of other races, but that is due to a couple of things: 1) D.C. is a plurality-black city, and 2) blacks are by far the majority in these teen takeovers. Unless the argument is that black people shouldn't be prosecuted for committing crimes, it is inevitable that black criminals will be a majority of the arrestees in this case. 

Of course, that is precisely what Leftists think, as shown in the reaction to the Karmelo Anthony verdict. The rules are different for black criminals. 

“When Black children do that, they are seen as criminals,” said Dodds, campaign director for Free DC, an organization advocating for the city’s sovereignty that has endorsed Lewis George. “I don’t even understand what we want children to do.” 

Actually, everybody knows what we want black children to do: obey the law, don't take over restaurants and significant chunks of cities whenever they feel like it, and act like civilized human beings. 

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It's really not that hard to understand, and the expectations are hardly unreasonable. Don't be savages. 

Chris Rock hit the nail on the head (NSFW):

It's really not that complicated. 

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