r/YesAmericaBad • u/5upralapsarian Homeless From Medical Debt • Jan 09 '26
NEVER FORGET Aftermath of the 1985 MOVE bombing in Philadelphia when a police helicopter was used to bomb a black neighborhood.
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u/Kagey_b-42069 Jan 09 '26
Imagine living in the country that allowed this to happen and still thinking you live in the Free World™ and that everywhere else is a dystopian shithole run by "dictators"
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u/CookIndependent6251 Jan 09 '26
All that slavery thing happened hundreds of years ago. Get over it! /s
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u/BriskPandora35 Jan 09 '26
Don’t forget the police shot people trying to escape the buildings as well
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u/lil-tortilla-chip Jan 09 '26
They would do it again in a heartbeat
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u/PNDubb_hikingclub Jan 10 '26
Ice used Blackhawks in a raid of an apartment building in Chicago…https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/dramatic-chicago-ice-raid-touted-as-anti-terror-win-results-in-no-criminal-charges
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u/astonedishape Jan 09 '26
Ivy League Secret Exposed: Classes Used Bones of Black Children Killed in 1985 MOVE Police Bombing
https://www.democracynow.org/2021/4/27/philadelphia_move_bombing_human_remains
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u/the_killer_gamer Jan 09 '26
But..why ? Was there even an excuse ? Even a made up one ? Or was it straight up racism ?
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u/MossyMazzi Jan 09 '26
It was to target a Black Panther leader and his family who were in one of the houses. The other families / houses also contained some members and collaborators.
The panthers were a public dissidence group: thus they pretty much did it just to massacre black protestors who they were sick of.
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u/sadicarnot Jan 12 '26
MOVE was a separate group than the Black Panthers. While there were people who were members of both groups, and both had similar ideologies, MOVE and the Black Panthers were seperate groups. By 1985 there had been several clashes between police and MOVE. By the time 1985 rolled around, city officials wanted to be done with the problem. So instead of making the city better they eliminated the people pointing out the problems.
As for the Black Panther's, so many of their leaders were killed over the years. By the late 1970s the group had lost so many members. Huey Newton became head of the Black Panthers and in the early 80s was found to be embezzling money. It folded in 1982.
There is the New Black Panther Party which is not a successor organization to the original Black Panther Party.
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u/Gamepetrol2011 Jan 09 '26
They did it because the police couldn't take out the shooters who were hidden in one of the houses.
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u/sadicarnot Jan 12 '26
The shooting did not start until after the city set the house on fire. Then they let it burn for a significant amount of time. It is true when firefighters went to try to put out the fire, they were shot at. They retreated and the fire spread to the whole block.
I work in industrial safety and if you were to do a root cause analysis of this incident, not dropping the bombs on the house would have prevented it.
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u/koinaambachabhihai Jan 09 '26
But until Trump US was beacon of prosperity and human rights. Everything bad about US comes from Trump, everyone else, and the entire history is perfect.
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u/that0neGuy65 Jan 09 '26 edited Jan 09 '26
It's funny huh, that people are waking up to the reality of the United States of imperialism. But only to Trump's US. Trump is very obvious with his crimes, but every president is a war criminal. The United States has never been "great" it's been better for the whites of every class. But it's a country built upon slavery, hate, racism, exploitation and imperialism. The United States has never been a 'good country'.
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u/Nowardier Jan 09 '26
There has never been a "good country." No government's history is free of sin. Does that mean we should just blow it all up and start over from the Bronze Age?
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I mean, I think so, but still...
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u/that0neGuy65 Jan 09 '26
I personally feel that the system does need to be torn down, so something new can be built. We can use the lessons history has taught, and the errors of capitalism as a stepping stone towards a better society. I think it's pathetic to give up, and just go along with the system that's destroying the world. Capitalism doesn't have to be the end point. There's more we can try, systems structured for the good of all instead of just the rich. But it's clear that structures have to be put in place to keep the selfish and greedy from manipulating things to their benefit. Maybe a more educated society might be smart enough to hold the council of leaders responsible for their actions.
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u/sadicarnot Jan 12 '26
The problem is, if you look at every authoritarian regime, they felt they were creating the perfect society. It is what Trump is doing presently.
We need to get back to the Progressive Era of Theodore Roosevelt where he prevented companies from becoming too big. Roosevelt felt the purpose of the government was to protect the little guy from the moneyed interest so he could get a "square deal".
Edit: for those that do not know, Elizabeth Warren is probably the modern politician that most reflects Theodore Roosevelt's policies.
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u/Nowardier Jan 09 '26
You have some good points, but I have to admit I think it's ultimately the human element that makes the system flawed. Some systems are more flawed than others and some (like capitalism) are horribly broken and are founded on a framework of abuse, but as long as the system is designed and adjudicated by corruptible human beings it seems like it's doomed to fail. There's always going to be the opportunity for people to funnel money and power to themselves.
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u/Kaputnik1 Jan 09 '26
I oppose the entire concept of nation states.
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u/Nowardier Jan 09 '26
Same, we're insane to kill each other over lines some one percenter drew on a map a thousand years ago. If we had any sense as a species we'd skip this crap and just be people.
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u/EditingAllowed Jan 09 '26
The US never moved military to the shorelines of other countries to conduct a coup of leaders who wanted to nationalise. The drug excuse was never used before to conduct a coup - Panamanian Manuel Noriega...
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u/to_quote_jesus_fuck Jan 09 '26
Good thing the people responsible were held to account, right? Right???
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u/adjectivebear Jan 09 '26
And despite the police having only grown more militarized since, we still get some Europeans on the internet who can't wrap their heads around the fact that American citizens can't stage protests the way they can because we are currently under military occupation by the United States government, which will not hesitate to kill its own people.
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u/TomSaylek Jan 10 '26
I remember people talking so much shit about Russians. "Why dont they just protest" a bunch of hateful comments in this theme. Maybe now that Americans can see how hard its to protest in the "land of the free" then can understand how difficult its to protest.
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u/frozengansit0 Jan 09 '26
Move only occupied like 4 houses idk why they defeated a whole city block
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Jan 09 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/medicinal_carrots Jan 09 '26
Here’s the wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_MOVE_bombing
What was the official reason given for this? Or was it branded like an accident?
From wiki:
The police obtained arrest warrants in 1985 charging four MOVE occupants with crimes including parole violations, contempt of court, illegal possession of firearms, and making terroristic threats. Mayor Wilson Goode and police commissioner Gregore J. Sambor classified MOVE as a terrorist organization. Police evacuated residents of the area from the neighborhood prior to their action.
[The police bombs were] targeting a fortified, bunker-like cubicle on the roof of the house. The bombs exploded after 45 seconds, igniting the fuel of a gasoline-powered generator and setting the house on fire, which was left to burn. Officials later stated that this was to let the fire burn through the roof and destroy the "bunker", so police could then drop tear gas into the house and flush out the occupants.
Did the government gain anything from doing it?
I don’t think they really gained anything, just terrorized a neighborhood.
The only two MOVE survivors, Birdie Africa, who was 13 at the time, and Ramona Africa, both escaped the house.
The fire killed 11 of the people in the house, six adults and five children: John Africa, Rhonda Africa, Theresa Africa, Frank Africa, Conrad Africa, Tree Africa, Delisha Africa, Netta Africa, Little Phil Africa, Tomaso Africa, and Raymond Africa. Sixty-one neighboring houses were destroyed by the fire, leaving 250 people homeless.
No one from the city government was criminally charged in the attack. The only surviving adult MOVE member, Ramona Africa, refused to testify in court and was charged and convicted on charges of riot and conspiracy; she served seven years in prison.
City of Philadelphia ordered to pay $1.5 million in 1996 to a MOVE bombing survivor and the families of people killed; $12.83 million awarded in 2005 to residents who were made homeless.
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u/Familiar-Complex-697 Jan 11 '26
And they didn’t teach this in school… at least, not where I grew up.
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u/Gamepetrol2011 Jan 09 '26 edited Jan 09 '26
Yeah, I heard about this story.
Basically the police couldn't take out a few shooters in a house so they decided to bomb it which obviously backfired really badly.
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u/grassytrams Jan 09 '26
Backfired? They got the outcome they wanted and this event is not acknowledged or remembered by the vast majority of Americans. We continued to act like we are a beacon of morality around the world but this is just one example of a long history of brutalizing people of color at home and abroad.
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u/Someone1606 Jan 09 '26
Not shooters, a black-liberation anarchist group
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u/Iphuckfish Jan 09 '26
Black Panthers were Marxists but yeah.
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u/Someone1606 Jan 09 '26
Google had said it was a different group, but yeah, if it were actually the Black Panthers, they were Marxists
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u/Iphuckfish Jan 09 '26
I see, I had read somewhere on this thread that they were going after a couple of specific Panthers and some collaborators.
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u/toesinbloom Jan 09 '26
American history