My Perspective: The War on Our Youth: A Spray of Gunfire, An Exodus of Hope

On July 2, 2009, the Detroit Free Press ran an Editorial entitled, “A spray of gunfire, an exodus of hope,” and within the article the editorial board of the Free Press makes it seem that the mass shooting near Cody High School in Detroit is something that takes place in the City of Detroit every day or something. However I guess the Free Press hasn’t read any of the newspaper in Chicago such as the Chicago Sun Times Chicago Sun Times Commentary entitled, “508 Chicago Kids Shot in just 16 Months, where the commentary speaks to the 508 kids who have been shot in the City of Chicago from September 2007 to December 2008.” In fact the commentary by the Chicago Sun Times revealed that 25 children in Chicago had been shot this school year but that was as of March 2009 and 32 or more have been shot since then.

Still the Detroit Free Press began their editorial saying that how many of those middle-class families -- the ones who are supposed to provide the foundation for Detroit's rebirth -- heard about what happened in the city Tuesday afternoon and said, "That's it, we're out of here"? The mass shooting that wounded seven teenagers in broad daylight near Cody Ninth Grade Academy speaks to a level of lawlessness that has to terrify anyone trying to raise a family in the city. If life in Detroit wasn't tough enough most days, a travesty like this is the proverbial last straw, the one that makes parents walk away, and quickly, before another school year begins. So if that is the case for Detroit than I wonder how Chicago residents are thinking. This school year alone, 25 Chicago Public Schools children have been murdered. As shocking as that is, that number doesn't begin to tell the real story of how deeply violence is a part of the everyday life of Chicago's children. Try this number out for size: A total of 508 Chicago school kids were shot from September 2007 through December 2008, according to data compiled by the school system and released to the Chicago Sun-Times. That's almost 32 children shot each month.

While most of these kids, thankfully, did not die. But the damage is tremendous nonetheless. There is the physical damage, which is awful enough. But the psychological damage can last much longer -- both for the victim and their classmates. Many kids in the most violent neighborhoods of Chicago are paralyzed by fear, and it's hard to blame them. They are thinking rationally. In 130 schools, at least one student has been shot since September 2007. In 15 schools, at least 10 students have been shot. In 12 other schools, at least 5 students have been shot. So if Detroit’s middle class are saying enough is enough than what is Chicago’s middle class thinking and has Chicago’s middle class exodus begun already.

Now the Detroit Free Press speaks about how witnesses said the victims were at a bus stop at W. Warren and Southfield when a green minivan pulled up and masked shooters opened fire. The two groups may have been involved in an earlier fight at the school. This is wrong on so many levels it's hard to know where to start, where to zero in on such a fundamental social breakdown: Kids with access to guns. Kids who think the way to resolve disputes is to use guns. Kids who seem to believe that in Detroit they can get away with firing them at will. Kids bleeding. Other kids watching them bleed. Kids who were going to summer school to catch up or get a head start -- and who won't be in summer school now because they're in the hospital or recovering at home, they're in jail or on the run, or their parents are too afraid to send them.

However what happened in Detroit is nothing like what has been happening in Chicago for nearly 3 years now. What happened in Detroit doesn’t even compare to the senseless violent acts of children killing children in Chicago where youth have ran on public transportation buses shooting with children being shot for trying to protect other students. Chicago School officials compiled the data I am talking that shows that 508 kids were shot in 16 months in order to look for patterns that might help them get a handle on the problem. It was collected under former Chicago Public Schools (CPS) CEO & the new Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. New schools CEO Ron Huberman is reviewed and verified the data. Like Detroit’s recent shooting, none of the children in Chicago were shot in school which is important to note. In fact, Bryan Samuels, the top CPS official who oversaw the data analysis, found the shootings were typically much closer to the victim's home than to his or her school. The median distance from the shooting to the victim's home was 0.4 miles, while the median distance to the victim's school was 1.2 miles. CPS also found that 70 percent of the shootings took place between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m. -- outside the hours of the school day and after-school programs.

So Detroit’s recent youth shooting is nothing like Chicago’s but according to the Free Press, you would think it is. Now don’t get me wrong, youth violence in America is always sad and it is something that has been taking place for years in this nation of ours. The war on our youth is something that many politicians, community activists, youth, parents and others have been fighting against for nearly three decades now since crack sprung up in the early 80s. However the violence in America has gotten worse in some areas with gang violence running rampage in many urban cities as more police officers are being laid off like never before. Now in the wake of such youth violence, many people scream for more gun laws or tougher gun regulation but the reality is that we don’t enforce the current laws that we have on the books correctly. We need to enforce our laws and get more serious as well as tougher about gun enforcement because tragedies like the ones that took place in Detroit on Tuesday and the ones taking place in Chicago are devastating to all involved.

However the Detroit Free Press doesn’t understand that and in their editorial they wrote that seven children shot is a very big, very bad thing for a city. The mayor ought to be out on the street, standing beside his police chief and vowing that the shooters will be brought to justice, reassuring Detroiters that everything possible is being done, and extending sympathy to the families of the wounded children, three of whom were initially in critical condition. The Free Press went on to say that instead, Mayor Dave Bing, after spending time Tuesday with the City Council discussing the city's budget, issued a tepid day-after statement expressing his sadness and outrage. "It is the role and responsibility of everyone -- government, police and community at large -- to do whatever is necessary to end this foolishness," the statement said. However the Free Press doesn’t acknowledge the fact that no matter what Bing did in a statement it won’t resolve the issue of the war on our youth. The Chicago Sun Times piece sums it up best by saying that our public schools can -- and must -- soften the blow of such violence and do more to prevent it.

In fact the editorial page of the Chicago Sun Times believes that one answer to the problem lies in compelling schools to adopt a radical new approach to teaching -- one that addresses the social and emotional needs of students. In too many Chicago schools, traumatized kids arrive for class each day filled with anger and despair. Inevitably, they disrupt classrooms, slow learning to a crawl and at times become violent themselves. Now I am not saying that is all that needs to be done to resolve youth violence and to start to win this war on our youth but it is start. Unlike the Free Press that criticizes Detroit’s mayor by saying that his actions goes beyond foolishness. They went on to say that it's the stuff that kills a city, drives people out and keeps them away. It's bold lawlessness that demands a bold response. A mayor cannot just issue a statement while he works on the budget. He has to be visible, reassuring and take-charge tough in the face of events like this. Because Tuesday's violent outburst is going to cost Detroit more than any budget problem.

While I do agree with the harsh words by the Free Press, it is not just enough to be visible and think that is leadership because a leader has a plan or at least puts one together that will address the issue at hand. Nonetheless the Free Press made it seem as if the recent youth violence in Detroit on Tuesday is something that takes place every day. In fact it is not and isn’t as bad as what takes in the streets of Chicago that is considered the norm to nearly everyone in the city almost that I have talked to. However the issue is that we do need to do something about gun violence that leads to youth violence but that has to be done with political leaders, community leaders, parents and youth working together to develop plans that can be implemented in schools as well as in communities and throughout cities that will approach the war on our youth in ways that we have not approached it before.

We cannot continue to sit on the sidelines and watch youth after youth die of senseless acts that cause more pain to families and friends than anyone can ever imagine. A spray of gunfire is not an exodus of hope but it is merely a reminder to all of us that we cannot abandon ship when the goings get tough but we must stick it out and fight to change it. The recent shooting in Detroit is an example of why Detroit must finally put together a plan that will deal with youth violence and the war on youth in ways that we have not dealt with before. This is an opportunity to cities like Detroit, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Baltimore, Atlanta, Memphis, Cleveland, and other urban cities throughout America where youth deaths are high and youth shooting are even higher to work together to share ideas about what works and what doesn’t works so that we finally put an end to this war on our youth that is taking hundreds of thousands of lives each year.

What is even more disheartening according to the Chicago Sun Times commentary is that most schools have little to offer those kids except overburdened social workers and counselors. Instead, as this page has pushed for months now, CPS should implement citywide a well-established, evidence-based approach now being rolled out in earnest in a handful of schools. The model program teaches basic skills that many kids don't get at home, such as how to get along and how to empathize -- skills that research shows improve test scores and behavior. The program provides more intensive counseling to needier kids. Now the Sun Times says that Duncan, before moving on to Washington to head the U.S. Department of Education, supported phasing in all or parts of the model into all Chicago public schools by 2011. His successor, Huberman, who has a social work degree, says he is studying the model. We urge Huberman to continue this vital work after a thorough review of its progress this year.

Such an idea should be looked at but that alone won’t fully resolve this war on youth but it is a start. As the Sun Times reported, an alternative plan was being proposed by Illinois State Rep. Monique Davis, a Chicago Democrat and former teacher and administrator. A bill she introduced this February that would require schools in violence-prone areas to hire a full-time social worker (most have only part-time help). And, in response to a Sun-Times report last year documenting pervasive fear among kids in violent areas and a lack of opportunities for them to blow off steam, Davis would require struggling schools to offer 10 to 15 minutes of physical activity a day and after-school programming. The concept is good, but the Sun-Times fear the bill is not sweeping enough and, without a clear funding source, could simply be another unfunded, burdensome mandate.

That’s another issue that needs to be addressed if we are going to deal with youth violence correctly. We must find funding sources to make sure we give our youth the type of things they need to deter them from wanting to resolve disputes through gun violence. We have to find ways to make sure we are giving our youth all we can give them to make sure that they find peaceful ways to deal with their problems even if that means putting social workers and counselors in all schools no matter what. However that won’t deal with the violence on the streets which is the heart of the problem. Much of the violence in this war on youth comes from the street and sometimes on rears its ugly head on the doors of a school. That’s why we as Americans cannot run from the problem as if gun violence can’t follow us to the suburbs because running won’t solve anything.

While the Free Press would want for the citizens of Detroit to panic, they shouldn’t fear over this recent gun violence when the citizens of Chicago have witness nearly 600 plus shootings to school children since 2007 with 34 being killed in 2008 and 32 or more being shot this past school year. If what is taking place in Chicago isn’t a crisis than I don’t know what is. However I don’t want to just say that Chicago is alone in this problem because they are not. Every urban city has a problem when it comes to youth violence but the truth of the matter is, this not the need for panic or abandonment but instead this is the need for ideas. This is the need for action. This is the need for us as Americans to finally set up and enforce the gun laws on the book while at the same looking for ways we can improve our schools, our neighborhoods and our cities in terms of better public safety and peaceful activities that our youth can participate in.

A spray of gunfire is never a means for an exodus of hope as the Free Press Editorial would suggest but instead it is a means for us to step up as Detroiters, as Chicagoans, as Detroiters to finally address the war on our youth head on. This is something that I have been advocating against for years and now it is time for us as Americans to finally address it across the nation. We must fight against senseless violence against our youth. We must end this war on our youth and this is the moment that many in Chicago have needed and many in Detroit have needed. Now all we have to do is make sure that we address this issue head on. The war on our youth must end now. We must restore hope by changing our actions, by changing our attitudes and by changing the mindsets of our youth.

We cannot allow a spray of gunfire to take our hope. We cannot allow a spray of gunfire to take our pride or our dignity. We cannot allow a spray of gunfire to make us fearful or scared. We cannot be afraid of a spray of gunfire because we have too much hope, too much pride and too much dignity to run away from the war on our youth. We owe our youth too much to give up on them now. We owe our youth too much to not protect them from senseless violence. Our youth want a better future and they are willing to work for peace but they need others to work with them. Therefore we have to be there for youth. We have to make sure our youth can see a better future. We have come too far to turn back down and we have gone through too much to allow a spray of gunfire to make us dash our dreams.

This war on our youth will not end unless we believe it will end. This war on our youth will not be won unless we believe we can win it. This is our moment to deal with gun violence that deals to youth violence once and for all. This is the time for us to deal with it. Therefore the Detroit Free Press and the Chicago Sun Times are right when they speak of the youth violence but they need to continue to talk about it. Don’t talk about when violence occurs but speak about it when there is no violence. Offer solutions to making sure such violence doesn’t take place in Chicago, in Detroit or any other city ever again. This is the time to do it. This is the moment we can do it and this is the time we can finally start winning this war on youth once and for all. I’m ready and I hope the rest of you are too.

We must HOPE! We must BELIEVE! We must EMPOWER! That is the only way we are going to win this war on our youth. It is time to win this war on our youth not now but right now.

Source:
Detroit Free Press Editorial—A spray of gunfire, an exodus of hope
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090702/OPINION01/907020366&template=printart

Chicago Sun Times Commentary—508 Chicago Kids Shot in just 16 Months
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/1466791,CST-EDT-edit09.article