You called those who stole lottery tickets during the Baltimore riots, "looters," but how do you define the wealthy people of Baltimore that put those people in the ghettos and take all the money out of it ("Looters in April riots made off with scratch-off tickets, but aren't necessarily winners," June 6)?
Those who took those lottery tickets and stole other things during the Baltimore riots stole those things to say "screw you," not just to steal them, but to let you know that they are there. The mass media has used words like "looters" and "thugs," concluding that these people are wrongdoers trying to steal everything, capitalizing on unrest for their personal gain. You are accusing a captive population robbed of everything of looting. Those people rioting in the streets were there for all the same reasons, regardless of how you classify and categorize the people of those communities in unrest.
And who put those lottery tickets there? Who do they benefit? Not those in those poor Baltimore neighborhoods. They give false hope to the poorest of this country who need money the most and have the least amount of it to spend.
They play out of desperation and overwhelmingly their hail marry pass to climb out of poverty ends up short, all the new games, new advertisements, new marketing and new retailers spring up in these areas, encouraging people to play more and more, all while the enormous profits goes to politicians and the government. The money is not invested back into the communities it's taken from. So who is really being looted?
Michael Sainato, Troy, N.Y.