YiJie Ye’s Vigil in Bay Ridge was a Political Mess
Lights, camera, action – Inviting the press to a community vigil is wrong!
Bay Ridge Cares should have limited the street vigil to the local paper and not allowed politicians to take over their event.
It’s strange that after a week after the incident, Councilman Brannan was talking about terrorism, when this incident was caused by a man’s poor mental health:
Last Monday, the NYPD quickly released the name of the suspect because journalists were linking the U-Haul ride to terrorist, Sayfullo Saipov case. (Info here) NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell went live to put that myth to sleep and say the incident was not terrorist related.
I don’t know anyone in Bay Ridge who was on edge after they saw the suspect arrested last week.
Two representatives from the Arab American Society in Bay Ridge spoke at YiJie Ye’s vigil. They talked about how incidents effect Arab American’s two ways when terrorism is mentioned.
**Why didn’t the head of AAA speak to Brannan about his inappropriate use of the word terrorism?
“Gounardes used the vigil to highlight concerns about traffic safety in the city.” (CBS News) This wasn’t about street safety at all – it was about a mentally ill man. During the vigil, Gounardes started talking about cars that drove by unsafely, rather than speaking about the man who had died. Andrew didn’t mention mental health.
NYC Comptroller, Brad Lander should not have spoken, as he has no connection to our community.
Senator Chu spoke about YiJie Ye’s children, but she should not have given out that much information because the young teens’ privacy is important.
Steve Mei, the head of the Chinese-American Planning Council, was spot on when he said more mental health services were needed for seniors.
Mayor Adams also spoke about mental health: “This person was experiencing some real mental health issues that we must focus on and face to make our city safe.” He will be releasing a new plan to help mentally ill NY’ers at the end of the month.
The words that are used in a community matter. The picture-taking pols will be gone in the blink of an eye, but while they are here, the community should be holding them accountable.
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Hugs,
marlene
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