Over the weekend in Chicago over 41 people were shot and about half dozen dead (according to the Chicago Tribune) including a beautiful little girl, it’s not the best weekend.
I began to read the news reports online and clicked on the comment section and wasn’t surprised with what I found. When it came to the shooting death of the little girl it was pretty much unanimous that people wanted the shooters dead. I understand what it is to lose someone and quickly feel the need for an action that will make me feel better because that’s what it’s really about it’s never about justice. Many of these people might have zero connection to that family but still grieve for that family and they want to hurt these guys. On a different shooting when it was another drive-by where a couple of young boys got hit people changed their tunes to “well look at where they live they shouldn’t be standing outside…” or “let me guess those boys were NOT gangbangers? Yea right not in that neighborhood!” Why do we have such different feelings about what child gets shot?
I saw someone post on face book asking a candidate what he would do about this violence if elected and I don’t think that is a fair question. ONE candidate cannot save an entire community from violence it will take each and every one of us to do that. Someone else posted saying that we should “gas them all…” another one suggested “…police cars on every corner where there’s gangbangers…” So our best reactions to a shooting are, gassing humans or placing a squad car on every corner we suspect has gang activity? I know that there’s a ton of after school programs, faith based programming, Boys and Girls clubs, other youth focused agencies but, is there an abundance of love and compassion for people in our communities? It’s obvious that there can be but a tragedy has to take place before it is shown and that is a serious problem. I’m in no way blaming everyone else I too have responsibility in all of this and will be the first one to raise my hand in guilt but I’m trying my best.
I took my life down a road that was necessary because resources were not available and the community “leaders” lost their faith in doing the hard work that is needed. That one bullet that can change a life touches so many lives from the person that works at a mine to extract the metal all the way to the cashier that sells the bullet then to the one the bullet enters. I apologize for saying it that way but we have to truly look at the much broader picture of who is involved here because to simply blame a “gangbanger” for what we all participate in is ridiculous. You may not think you have any participation in the violence but every day that we do not take action is a day we missed to impact the violence in our communities.
I do not advocate for more police because it is unfair to the police force to have to deal with every single thing in our communities. I do not advocate for people to arm themselves and take the law into their own hands because we have the Florida incident as an example of how it can go terribly wrong. I do not advocate for long marches down a street chanting “Stop the violence” because the issue isn’t that people like shooting other people it goes much deeper than that.
What I do advocate for is serious conversations about poverty with an action plan that doesn’t involve millions of dollars spent on a lobbyist to enact a law.
I do advocate for people of Faith to take a serious look at themselves and take an inventory of your priorities and decide if you are following what you preach.
I do advocate for politicians to work full time and be held accountable for that time so that they are spending more time in their communities rather than being in a room arguing that they are right to other politicians waiting to do the same.
I do advocate for equal and full funding for each and every public school in America regardless of economic and/or demographic background because education is a solution to many of our problems.
I do advocate for review and reform of juvenile detention centers because those places should be about saving our youth from making horrible decisions.
I do advocate for giving the right to vote to our citizens of 16 and 17 years of age because they are informed and proactive in many ways adults are not.
And I do advocate for people to have the WILL for a positive change in our society.
I think the last one is the toughest one of them all because it challenges us all to deal with our personal issues and we tend not to do that. This is in no way an easy task or a simple one either but the ingredients are in front of us to make or break our own society, which way do you want to go?
As I wrote this I was listening to the police radio band and heard a call go over the radio like this:
“1752?” “1-7-5-2…”(in response); dispatch—“did you guys find a victim over there?” (1752 response) “No I didn’t find anyone over here……with a bullet wound……oh damn…” in a very sarcastic tone…
Peace/AMOR
Gerardo
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