Looking for Peace.....in depths you may not be ready for

I was having lunch with my mom today and she was telling me about how she went out and got a part time job today working with families, in particular helping them communicate better with their children.  My mom worked for Hull House Association for 20+ years and retired months before we found out that they were closing their doors.  My mom was hurt by the news and quickly became worried about the families she was working with.  Today she tells me that she can see better how one that works in a social service agency can be blinded by what is actually going on in the community and she saw that today for the first time.  My mom said that she realizes that she needs to do more in the community because what the traditional community based organizations are doing is not enough.  So she asked me about the violence and why is it that I’m not involved with an agency working to reduce the violence.  So I described to her how life of a social worker and violence prevention specialist is like these days and here it goes:

Cease Fire (CF) has managed to suck up all the funding for violence prevention and then acts as a clearing house for other community based organizations that need their “expert” advice.  CF hires well known Brothers and Sisters in the community and by that I mean siblings, aunts, uncles, daughters, sons, etc…of former and/or current gang leaders.  They also hire Brothers that have recently come home from prison that held some weight in the past or currently do (Tio the Exec. Dir of CF IL will say that CF is unaware of anyone being currently involved in a gang…that’s just to save his ass) to work as outreach workers.  Now, on the face of it looks like a good idea and it can be but there has to be intensive work going on with these Brothers at the same time.  See, when you have been in prison for a long time it’s like coming home from a tour in Iraq. You’ve seen things that no one should see, you were in a tense state of mind 24/7 with no break in sight, you lacked emotions because you didn’t want others to think you were weak.  As time goes on it develops into PTSD among other types of physiological issues.  I don’t know this first hand because I’ve never gone to the military nor have I done time but I have had the opportunity to be around plenty of Brothers that have been in either spot.  So without an opportunity of becoming part of the society again we throw them back into a tense situation where they have to rely on past behaviors to deal with the issues.  Not only that but then they don’t have a full understanding that smoking, drinking, and helping look out for the police are NOT behaviors that a prevention worker should be exhibiting with their “clients.” If you’re out on the street working the very last thing you should be doing is acting like you in the street…I know it might be hard for some of you to understand that but bear with me.  

So given all of that we now give them a salary and full benefits and these are two things these Brothers and Sisters thought they would never have.  All they do is try to control the reaction of some of these Brothers out on the street but shouldn’t they be doing something else?  Well that would mean that they all need a Master’s degree in Social Work because apparently only then will you have the key to fix everything! (with a sarcastic tone) When these community based organizations (CBO’s) get their crew of CF workers the local agency has no control or say so over them but do require them to participate in the agency’s activities and programs and here’s where the false thought of “we did something today” comes into play.

CF workers are told that the CBO is holding a Youth BBQ to kick off the summer so they are asked to bring a certain number of youth.  CF workers go back into their hoods and draw up a list of people that are going and are told to show up.  Who in their right mind is going to turn down a free BBQ?!  So youth show up and the CBO’s Exec. Dir. is glowing with excitement because there’s troubled youth at the BBQ.  The youth walk over to CF worker and asks “how long we got to stay because we got to get back to the hood?”  CF worker says “not too long I’ll let you know.”  The Exec. Dir walks over to CF workers and asks “are they having fun?  I saw them come over and talk to you guys”  CF workers says “yea they like it but they going to have to go soon because they got some things to take care of.”  Exec. Dir leans in and says “oh like gang stuff?  OK well I’ll go tell them thanks for coming.”  Exec. Dir. walks over to youth and says “HEY GUYS!  Thanks so much for coming today and if you guys want to take a plate with you go ahead” the youth start to kind of smile and nudge each other that it’s time to go and one of them will start to make a plate of all the good stuff.  The youth all walk over to CF workers and let them know that they want to go and the CF worker says “yea ok I’ll walk you guys back to your cars.”  So as the CF workers walk away with the youth the Exec. Dir. and other staff are all watching them and thinking to themselves ‘I impacted someone today’ when in actual events one of the CF workers is the chief and order these Brothers to come through.

My point in this is that when you have to order someone or as I used to say “strongly suggest” someone to participate in something like that the only impact you made is to let them know you really don’t care if they have the skills to survive in life.  Now, some of these CBO’s will have a “youth leadership” event or something but it never talks to where these Brothers are at in their lives.  We fill a book bag worth of stuff we copied or printed out, pamphlets about STD’s, business cards of people that might be hiring, a t-shirt with some silly logo on it, and fill their stomachs with Pizza and Pepsi.  They get home from the event and dad is still kicking moms ass, Brother is out around the corner doing stuff he shouldn’t, sister is secretly texting someone older from the hood that has been watching her grow up waiting for the right time to screw her but she thinks it’s positive attention, and well the Pizza you had was more food than there is in the house…did you really impact that youth’s life?

Some people might say that these CBO’s are trying and to be honest No they are not trying because if they were trying then Zero tolerance policy’s wouldn’t be posted all over their walls about who they will and will not help according to that policy.  There’s a much deeper need that is NOT being met in our communities and the places you would think would have that ability to fulfill that need are the one’s helping the violence continue in an indirect way.

Regardless of my background I would always lay it out loud and clear to who I worked with that my objective was to get them in a better place in their lives meaning that I would address everything around them.  I know that some of the older guys that I know had issue with me being like that but I also know that I helped them change a bit as well.

What CF is doing is based on a model that was given to them by someone that did not understand how to implement the strategy because they had no part in it.  For those of us that helped create that model we know what is missing and no one cares to hear about it and CF is incapable of implementing it because the Brothers that they have expressed no desire of going that deep. 

With each death of every child in Chicago I lose more and more respect for the community based organizations that I once championed as well for the “organizers” that are unwilling to deal with this issue.  The amazing thing about it is that there is no need for a $15million building to be built for it to happen…did Jesus, Buddha, MLK, Malcolm X, or Che need that to impact people?....I’m sure someone out there will criticize me for putting those names together but think about what they did and how they did it and YOU tell me if we need a $15million building to get things done.

Peace/AMOR

Gerardo

Looking for Peace.....in a phrase.

I’ve been quiet for the last few weeks mostly because I felt I had an emotion overload and needed to pause for a moment.  Within that time many people have been shot, killed, and injured due to violence here in Chicago but as I scan through the newspapers and tweets I am interested in people’s choice of words and phrases.  The one that catches my eye the most is when people say “they died in senseless violence…” do people understand what they are saying?  We cannot make an excuse for it and say ‘well you know what I mean’ because when people say these things in a moment of anger or sadness it is what they truly feel.  

If we look at the word “senseless” the definition for it is: destitute or deprived of sensation; unconscious.  So the statement is saying that someone died in the middle of an unconscious moment of violence, would it have been better if they died in a moment of conscious violence?  I know it doesn’t sound right but that is what the statement of “senseless violence” is implying.

Most of the people (there are others) I have read about or watched say a statement like this have been people in an impoverished, gang, or drug type of community or Pastors.  Why is that? The neighborhood I grew up in was a blue collar community and we had our gangs but rarely drugs until the mid to late 1980’s. In 1989 we moved further North into a higher income community but with a higher rate of racism from the community, school, and the police. I didn’t go back too much to the community I grew up in but by 1994 I was back in that community and in other poor communities working on reducing violence.  So it hasn’t been until very recent times that I have not been either living and/or hanging out in some of these communities and I feel out of place and out of touch.  But it has given me the opportunity to rewind my thoughts and feelings about what I experienced.

Most of the people that I’ve known over these years were people that have had hard lives either by choice (in their older age) or because “it is what it is” and that’s where the phrase “senseless violence” lives within these communities.  In a community where the city government has forgotten (by choice I believe) to service, where the board of Education doesn’t think that the school needs new books or windows, where Churches view the area residents as “devils” it is common to see violence as a way of life.  Not because they are monsters but because people are fighting to survive on a daily basis. In a community that is lacking the very basic of human needs and rights you have to do what you have to do to survive so violence is born in these sorts of environments. 

So as people have grown accustom to seeing violence the feeling that some of it might make sense is not uncommon.  They might have witnessed what can be seen as positive results from violence being inflicted on the local store owner that was over charging certain customers.  They might have seen the local bully get beat up because he took advantage of a disabled person and the Brothers out on the street took care of it after calls to the police went unanswered. 

In all of this you have Pastors in local churches that witness some of these events as well and they try to help but place the condition of “You MUST accept Jesus Christ as your Savior” before any real help is dished out.  Not all of these pastors say that or imply it but some of them that have large congregations start to walk around like a chief of their own gang when they come out of their churches.  When the Brothers on the street see this they tend to check up on these pastors to see if they truly are a chief or are just trying to walk a walk they shouldn’t be walking.  Most if not all of these pastors fail quickly in the presence of these Brothers because they don’t have the heart that these Brothers do in terms of being secure in their role.  So when these pastors fail they become submissive to the despair that flows through that community and plug into the matrix of “it is what it is.”

When these Pastors accept that they just became part of the system that accepts that there is a level of violence that makes “sense” and that is truly an unconscious thought. 

We cannot think that a level of violence is acceptable in our society because someone will start to place standards on whom, what, and where that violence is acceptable and chances are that it won’t be the people that the violence will affect…but has someone already done so?

What is a sensible act of violence, can you tell me?

Peace/AMOR

Gerardo

Looking for Peace.....in a chant?

“Stop the violence!”

“Stop shooting!”

“Stop killing!”

These are very typical chants that are common in the streets of Chicago when a group of people get together to protest recent shootings in their communities.  I am sure that everyone would agree with those chants but are the chants in vain?

There have been many ideas to stop the violence in Chicago and one of them was to incarcerate all the gang leaders because they thought that people would just automatically walk away and it would end it all.  The FBI tried this back between 1993 through 1998 and failed because today we are suffering from the actions taken back then.  How you ask? Great question!

A gang leader was indicted in a Federal case that took him down and several others and in that process people started to make deals with the FBI to avoid prison time.  As the Feds start to vet these people they realize that if they flip them they can flip others as well so they hit the streets to find more people with more “information.”  Once the Feds used who they needed they would determine their value and many times they would simply cut them loose and tell others within that gang who they used as an informant.  Then we get a surge of violence because people are trying to get those that “snitched” and in that process sometimes the wrong people get hit and when that happens it creates a whole new cycle.  The Feds got who they feel they needed to get and send him away for life but left a world of confusion out on the street.  So now you have a teenager pissed off because now they have a world on their shoulders and other guys out there see an opportunity and take action and now everyone is at each other’s throats.

I hear you, “then why be part of the street!?” Good point but then why do schools have to run on lower budgets in poor communities?  Yes those two are connected!

So here we are in 2012 and the Cook County state’s attorney wants to create a RICO Act for the state of IL here’s the definition of RICO.  That means that they want to recreate what others did back in the mid 1990’s meaning that they must have not done their homework or they just don’t care how this goes down.  So that brings up the question of, who is benefiting from the violence in Chicago?

We look at down state prisons where whole communities depend on a job at the local state prison rather than an industry like automobiles, textile, machinery, or any type of Farming! The industry in these communities is based on the demise of mostly poor people in the city of Chicago!  Doesn’t that turn your stomach just a bit?  There are people out there that DEPEND on someone to commit murder so that they can have a job and a pension!  Does that turn your stomach?

Our society has chosen to lie to ourselves by giving false hope that we can “stop the violence” when the truth is that NO Governor, Mayor, or any other politician is going to put whole communities out of work to save lives of the poor.  Is this what OUR life is about?  Do we eat our young?  It sure looks like it according to recent statistics on the ages of the people that commit the crimes and the ones receiving the crime.  We rather watch entire communities on the South and West side of Chicago go to SHIT than to provide EVERY possible city and state service that are due to them for the simple fact of being HUMAN! I’m not saying that we have to hand feed anyone for a special reason but living on the North Side of Chicago I know that if I complain about my garbage can being broken I’ll get a new one the following week.  I can complain about a car sitting in the same spot for more than a week and the following day someone has already come out and marked up the car for towing.  Go to the South side and street lights are out, pot holes are so much part of the street you swear the street was paved like that, trash is overflowing in the alleys, and empty lots have abandoned cars that have been burnt out a long time ago.

The Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) recently said that they are cutting train service from 63^rd to 95^th street to repair the line for 5 months,  They will provide shuttles to replace the service and they said it was either this or a long 4 year project with many more delays.  People complained and said that this would never happen on the North Side and they are right!  Why?  Because for as long as I can remember the CTA is on a constant maintenance schedule on all the train lines on the North Side to prevent having to close down the system in the future for needed repairs.  This action from the CTA is a HUGE sign of how this city “works” for some people and how it doesn’t work for others.  How is this connected you ask?  Great question!

IF the city had made EVERY school a priority since day one and provided 100% equally funding to every school as well as services our city would look and feel differently today!  But the reality is that our city runs on a neighborhood mentality which means no one is going to look out for anyone else unless they from their HOOD!

So when a “pastor” talks about “ending violence in America” but wants to flush $15million into a building that will RECREATE if not triplicate services that already exist in the Chicago area you really have to ask yourself is it really being done for everyone or just for the people in that HOOD?

I’ll let you look into that if you want to know the answer.

Peace/AMOR

Gerardo

Looking for Peace.....in my actions.

I just read an article titled “Why do Christians need to make it all better?”  written by Stephanie S. Smith for Relevant magazine and it touched on why do Christians hurry to hope in tough times and how it sometimes doesn’t get better.  This article came out today in a time that Chicago is reporting that 40 people were shot over this long weekend that happens to be a memorial for those that have given their lives in the military.  Do we rush to say that there is hope that things will get better and ignore the process of what needs to happen for it to change?

As I have written before that 40 people being shot in a city of more than 2.6million (9.4million if we look at it as a Metro area) is not a large number but nonetheless it’s 40 more than anyone of us would like to see and I use the term “anyone” very loosely.  I say that because I see that some people are more hurt over the killings in Syria but make no mention of the killings here in Chicago.  Syria’s population is just over 22million as a whole country and not to say let’s play the number game here to see who’s pain is worst but it does open the eyes a bit.

I cannot stress enough how frustrating this all is when after a weekend like this most people that tag themselves as “progressive community organizers” just ignore the issues and wants everyone they know to sign some sort of petition for something else.  Why are they not worried about these shootings?  Some people will even say “omg that’s not far from my house!  What did I move into!?” is that really your reaction?  Was the trendy neighborhood not so “cool” anymore?

OK back to this article and how it relates to the shootings and violence….

Stephanie S. Smith asks us to “resist the urge to resolve” and that’s hard to do for any of us because we all feel like we have the solution and I could sit here and write about how certain programs are not working and which one’s might do better.  I could say that places like Cease Fire are NOT the solution and they are sucking up all the funding for better services and they should be shut down BUT I just won’t go there right now ;-)  What the article has brought to the forefront of all of my thoughts, as a follower of Jesus teachings, is did Jesus have to die in a violent way to make His point?

For those of you that have watched The Passion of the Christ by Mel Gibson he goes into some savage detail of what possibly happened to Jesus as He walked with his cross to be crucified.  I remember watching that and thinking why didn’t they just snatch him up and yanked up on the cross and just nail him to it, wouldn’t that have been traumatic as well not only for him but for those watching?  His along with many people of that time, death was a gruesome event and meant to horrify people into NOT committing crimes.  So fast forward to present time and I’m thinking are we subconsciously allowing for these shootings to take place so that we can indirectly horrify our youth to the dangers of becoming involved with gangs and drugs? And I say “we” as in the community organizers, clergy, and educators that are supposed to be on the front lines of these issues in a setting like the city of Chicago.  The answer is YES and I dare to say that some of us are doing it consciously as well. 

So then what do we do?  It is a very complicated issue when we allow ourselves to get stuck on this idea of hope and keeping that hope alive because we are unwilling to go through the whole process.  I feel like we are waiting for our “Batman” to arrive and basically do everything that none of us are willing or wanting to do and that is to deal with the pain and ugliness of this all. 

Over the weekend I had plans on enjoying the hot weather and taking the time to do nothing instead I spent all of Sunday dealing with an issue.  A young Brother of mine had some serious events take place in his life and reached out to me for help.  If I didn’t answer him we could very well be talking about 41 shootings and 11 deaths over the weekend.  I knew what his expectation of me was and I couldn’t play the role of “gangster” for him because that’s not what it called for.  I pledged to him as well to his father that I would be a Brother to them and there when they needed me, they could be right or wrong I would be there for them.  So the process begun with an explanation of what happened and I quickly assured him that I would be there for him but also gave him some things to think about while I made my way to him.  Once we meet up I knew that he was ready for action as I was too but my action was different.  We go up to his parents apartment and we sit down and go through it all so I understood what was going on.  Once I knew that the opposition was an unknown character and there’s money at play I knew this could turn out bad.  So I gave him the layout of what my thoughts were and what I felt was the right approach but in all of this I never assured him that things would be “OK” and that “let’s hope things work out.”  Instead I made him aware of his own responsibility in this event and how he could address it properly with the least amount of negative impact.  I knew he didn’t want to hear everything I had to say about certain things but he respected me enough to sit there and listen.  At the end of it things “worked out” but the process wasn’t over because there shouldn’t always be a happy ending in this case instead it just needs to end and it did.  I don’t say that in any way to sound like a jerk but the reality of things is that sometimes things end and no one is happy and no one is sad it just ended.  What we try to focus on is to always make a happy ending and we skip the learning part of these events.  Well the evening ended with one more lesson and that was that we can never control what others do but we sure can turn that wheel and have a different outcome.

The violence in Chicago keeps going because many of us refuse to put ourselves in the position of being that true advocate for change.  

What would be different if ALL pastors TRULY spoke of Gods never ending LOVE without any bias as to whom you screwing in the bedroom? 

What would be different if ALL community organizers TRULY fought for EVERYONE in the community? 

What would be different if ALL educators where given ALL the tools they needed to TRULY educate our youth so that they were better prepared to deal with issues?

I’m not trying to make myself out to be anything other than a Brother that cares…

I’ll leave you with this because this is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time…

If people believe that every single word in the Bible is 100% God then when we turn to the very last book in the Bible we come to understand that a very violent act that cannot be duplicated by us will take place to bring about Peace and Heaven, so does that mean that there are some church folk that just see the violence on the streets as a process that God is going through and that’s why it keeps happening?

Peace/AMOR

Gerardo

Looking for Peace.....just in love.

Over the last few months I have expressed myself in ways that some of my family members strongly disagree with here on this blog and I am sorry.  I’m sorry that they have narrow minds and think that I am doing this to just piss people off and those of you that know me well know that even though that might be part of it it’s mostly out of education and love. 

I have had some family members disconnect with me via FB and I recently heard that it was because I have said things that not everyone agrees with.  So I sat and wondered what I might have said, was it that I believe in same sex marriage?  I believe it for several reasons and really what is it of your business what someone else does with someone they love?!  When I hear a guy talk about how much he hates Gay men and what they do to each other I always ask why is then that they keep thinking about other men’s penises ?  I know the truth is that they wish they could enjoy another man’s penis as well! Oh I’m sorry is that something, again, that I have said that not everyone agrees with? I'll try to warn ahead next time.

Maybe it has been because I have made it known of my strong connections on the street, well to be honest some of these very same family members always thought of me as a criminal anyway so why the issue now?  Maybe because I have been out spoken about my differences with the US government but wouldn’t that then mean that I have a strong love for my land?  How is it that these family members have decided what “everyone” agrees with or not?  Oh maybe it’s because some of these family members are hateful individuals that focus on money as the only form of success or if you hate Gay people then you are sure to get into Heaven…oh wait right you don’t hate them you just know for sure that they are going to Hell so you pray for them every night. And you don't hate people without money you just see them as poor souls you don't care to be around because they are losers in your eyes.

I am well aware of what I say and when I say and to whom I say it because God has given me the RIGHT to say what I want to say even if it is against Him. (I know that some of these family members just read me saying that I’m against God even though I didn’t say that…is that my mom’s phone ringing…) So they chose to “cut me off” from FB like an angry child that doesn’t want to hear anything other than what they want to hear.  I’m not bothered by the FB thing but it does bring up a question, do I visit them when I am in their town?  As I am accustom of doing when I travel is reaching out to people I know if I find myself in a town where I know people.  I think it is not cool to be in someone’s town to visit then leave and say “oh yea I was there sorry I didn’t reach out” so do I or don’t I say at least HELLO? 

Well the good thing is that I really wasn’t raised around extended family anyway so the hurt isn’t deep at all it’s just more of an annoyance because it affects others that do not share the views of those particular family members like a son or daughter or even a sibling.  So then am I supposed to just remain silent and go with the flow? If I did then I wouldn’t be me so for the family members that disagree with the things I say I ask that why wouldn’t you do the “Christian” thing and open a dialog with me to find a peaceful medium so that there isn’t any awkwardness?  To hard?  Right Jesus died for you so you wouldn’t have to lift a leg in life to make a difference for anyone and fight for those that cannot fight for themselves or do the most basic teaching of Jesus which is LOVE because you already saved so why bother! 

Love is a hard thing to do because it means that you have to challenge yourself on a daily basis.  When I decided to Love people for who they are I had to do it in the mist, WARNING to family I am about to say something that might offend you, of a bunch of hard core gang members.  So to ease them into understanding that I didn’t hate Gay people or anyone for that matter I started with telling them that I loved them.  Well at first it didn’t go over so well because I was rejected without hesitation!  I would get looks of disgust or they would take a few steps back as if I were about to jump on them.  For those that took it as if I was hitting on them I quickly reminded them of how ugly they were as well as their lack of proper employment.  So as time went on I kept pushing the envelope with them and since I had a bit of respect I knew no one was going to take a shot at me.  So as time went on I would let them know I loved them before I would leave the corner or their house.  One time I had one of their mothers ask what it was that I said and I told her that I loved her son and she quickly pushed me out of the house and said that she wanted her son to get married but not like that!  We all laughed because I told her I would need a better looking partner with good credit.

Then one day I went to go see one of the main guys and it was around New Years Eve and he was busy getting drunk.  He gave me a NYE gift and I hugged him kissed him on the cheek and told him I loved him and to be safe, I’ve never seen him smile so big, he smiled and said “I know.”  After that I kept showing love for my Brothers and I wasn’t afraid to show it and it became interesting one day when one of these Brothers blew a kiss at me.  He did it in front of other Brothers and his girlfriend.  She was not happy and told him that she was going to go find herself a real man and I got out of the car and walked up to her and said “you have found a real man because he was not afraid to show his true feelings in front of others” So I hugged him and kissed him on the cheek and left.  After that the younger Brothers began to show a strong sense of respect for me and would shake my hand with a lot of strength.  I asked one of them that I barely knew and really didn’t remember his name that why would he go out of his way to say hello to me all the time and he said “because you a real Brother and I admire that!” 

To many that might not mean anything because it was coming from a “gangbanger” but it means the world to me because I knew that this Brother had a totally different understanding of what LOVE meant.  Now isn’t that something a person viewed as a criminal has a better sense of LOVE than someone that shoots out quotes from the Bible about who is going to Hell!  It reminds me of who Jesus had by his side…

I may not have a formal college education, a six figure income, multiple properties, a car, 401K, or even health insurance but I do have my heart full of LOVE and I wouldn’t trade that for the world.  So if I offend you with what I say then I apologize because this is how God made me so, you might then want to complain to Him.

Peace/AMOR

Gerardo