Let the Fire Burn is a documentary about how MOVE, a radical leftist green movement predominantly consisting of black people, offended their black neighbors and the Philadelphia police. Let the Fire Burn has no narration other than what is provided in the archival news footage, a recorded deposition of a child from MOVE and footage of the public committee hearing. The public committee meeting seemed to consist of state government and community leaders. They investigated how an eviction of MOVE members led to the complete destruction of the surrounding neighborhood and the death of five children and six adults on Mother’s Day.
Let the Fire Burn is somewhat frustrating because the investigation makes a lot of assumptions that probably could have been made in the 1980s when people knew more about the group, but now viewers like me know nothing about MOVE. Let the Fire Burn never explicitly delineates what illegal acts MOVE engaged in. MOVE members definitely violated housing code. They were dreadful neighbors, and I would have hated living next to them. They were definitely guilty of child abuse, but the government did not seem to know about that until after the conflagration. The investigation concluded that MOVE’s guns were not functional, but owning guns is not innately illegal. If the government concluded that their guns were not functional, how could they be found guilty of killing a police officer? The government seemed to conclude the officer’s death was friendly fire, but never explicitly says that.
Let the Fire Burn wants viewers to come to its own conclusion. My conclusion was that respectability politics colored people’s perception of a crazy group of people. It did not help that the majority of those crazy people were black, which intensified the fears of the government officials. People were right to be outraged, but they were outraged about the wrong thing-property destruction and profanity rather than child abuse. This outrage led to dehumanizing the MOVE members as people. This dehumanizing view led to a disproportionate government response to MOVE members’ actions. Ironically the government’s actions resulted in what the government feared MOVE would do: property destruction and loss of life. Unfortunately the only possible good apple, Officer James Behaier, is plagued with guilt when he should not be and derided by his colleagues.
If people were wondering why there was so much public outrage over news coverage of and government response to the Colorado militia occupying federal government land, watch Let the Fire Burn. Let the Fire Burn is a must see documentary because it teaches us that we will be doomed to repeat the same actions if we don’t learn from these events (cough *Waco* cough). First, crazy people with big mouths are sometimes full of crap and are not as threatening as they seem, even if they are black. Second, obnoxious, awful people are not always doing something illegal. Third, if the property is a mess, forget the property and look at the children. If adults cannot take care of property, then they may not be adequately taking care of their children. Help the children first. Fourth, if awful people are doing something illegal, be clear about what law is violated and don’t let your offended sensibilities color your response. All law enforcement should be proportionate to the legal violation. Fifth, if you do respond disproportionately, stop when you realize that things have gotten out of hand and try to rectify the situation. You can tell that things have gotten out of hand when people trying to escape a fire are running back into the flames, and you have literally set everything on fire.
Finally, Let the Fire Burn’s most solemn lesson is that even when a community and government repent of disproportionate action in a public way, there will be little real world consequences except to the heroes and victims of the tragedy.