Over the past several weeks, I've been keeping tabs on the situation in Zimbabwe. Seems that the government is on a mission to rid it's capital city of poverty. Hooray! Right?

Wrong.

The program, officially called "Operation Drive Out the Trash", was aimed at the shantytowns of the capital city Harare. In May, police were authorized to raze homes, "informal markets", and other structures in poverty-stricken areas in both the city and countryside. Recently, the demolition has spread to "unauthorized garages, cottages, and chicken coops". All this going on in the middle of the African winter. Promoted as "urban renewal", Operation Drive Out the Trash has left thousands homeless and forced to squeeze into tents.

The story hasn't received much attention internationally. Why not? True, it's no Darfur or Rwanda. Yet.

Perhaps it's widely overlooked simply because it's a slightly aggressive approach to gentrification, which is widely accepted around the world today. Look up gentrification anywhere on the net and you'll likely first hear about how it's a rehabilitation of low-income housing and deteriorated neighborhoods into high-value communities and business districts. Call it urban renewal if you will. But towards the end of most definitions, you'll find an admission that the whole process displaces the long-time, poorer residents. Go downtown of most cities in America and you'll see examples of it in the form of old warehouses turned into lofts and restaurants, brand new cobblestoned streets, etc.

It's Zimbabwe mirrored in the cities of Waco, Nashville, Houston, Chicago and elsewhere. Maybe the police here in the U.S. didn't rip down poor residents' homes and chicken coops with virtually no notice. But we've made the cost of living so expensive in these areas, that the poorer residents were practically squeezed out. We've forced the homeless to hide or leave town by making it illegal to sleep under bridges, in vacant buildings, and on park benches.

So as I sit here appalled at what's going on across the Atlantic, perhaps it is best that I simply do that--just sit here. For that's what I continue do as our domestic brothers and sisters suffer similar fates.