shesus

I spend the majority of my days teaching in the ‘ghetto’, i.e. a low-income and black neighborhood. Everyday when I go to the school, I pass by trash, homeless people, drug dealers, empty beer cans and liquor bottles littering the ground in front of the school. The majority of buildings in this neighborhood are pawnshops, liquor stores, bars, or vacant. There were riots in this neighborhood after Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination destroying 75% of the businesses. After all these years, many lots are still empty. Some mornings, the door closest to my car is locked and I have to walk around to the front of the school never knowing what comments or actions the gangs on the corners might make. Once inside the school, the majority of my time is spent doing crowd control, listening to arguments and trying to intervene before they become physical which involves not only fists, but pencils, scissors, and/or chairs. I hear things from the elementary students daily like: “Shut up, nigga”, “Move your black ass, you goin’ too slow”, “Pfft, I don’t care”, “You can’t make me do nothin’”, “Bitch, I don’t know why he’d want to fuck you”, and “You make my testicles hurt”. These aren’t viewed as problems because “these children are victims of their ‘ghetto’ culture.” In other words, we are told by parents and administrators that “that’s just the way they are” as in “boys will be boys”. Yet, one man says ‘nappy headed hoes’ on the radio and the same people who excuse the students’ behavior demand that this man be fired. We have been told that as white people, we can’t relate to or understand the challenges of the students we teach. With these attitudes, people in this area will never succeed in breaking the stereotypes because they justify these behaviors as part of their culture. Yet, when someone outside makes the same observation, they are called racist and are ostracized for their comments.

I watched Jesse Jackson on the news Monday marching in front of the NBC building here in Chicago demanding Imus get fired. He vowed to march everyday until his demand was met. Yet, Tuesday, Imus still had a job and Jesse Jackson was nowhere to be found. Jackson claims to care about racial equality, yet apparently he does not follow through on promises. In my 3 years teaching in the ghetto, I have never seen nor heard Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, or any other racial ambulance-chasers in any of the schools here doing their best to improve the lives of these people. Instead, I see them on television talking about “hymies” and “diamond merchants”. In fact, when Bill Cosby stood up and spelled out the problems he sees in these types of areas, he was called a traitor to his race by these same people.

But Jackson and Sharpton succeeded; we won't have that racist talk on television or radio anymore. Wait, what's that? Oh, you mean the incessant use of “bitch”, “hoe”, and “nigger” and the glamorization of the ghetto fabulous living one can hear glamorized on television and radio? You mean Sharpton and Jackson aren’t marching to stop that? I suppose that’s not racist or sexist. In fact, on the Today show Friday morning, Jason Whitlock, a columnist for the Kansas City Star, brought up this same point. His comment was not discussed because the real problem is Imus.

There is a problem and it’s not Imus or any of the other people who have spouted out racist comments in the past few months. The problem is that fact that the cycle of being a victim not only continues, but also is excused because ‘that’s their culture’. My students are living it and I’m attempting to do my little part to fix it. If I state what the problem is, I stand the chance of being called a racist. If a black person states the problem, they stand the chance of being called a traitor. The problem is larger than any of us and is going to take a lot of work to fix. The problem was best said in Jason Whitlock’s column this past week:

“It is us. At this time, we are our own worst enemies. We have allowed our youths to buy into a culture (hip hop) that has been perverted, corrupted and overtaken by prison culture. The music, attitude and behavior expressed in this culture is anti-black, anti-education, demeaning, self-destructive, pro-drug dealing and violent.

Rather than confront this heinous enemy from within, we sit back and wait for someone like Imus to have a slip of the tongue and make the mistake of repeating the things we say about ourselves.”

The culture of the ghetto is that learning is not cool. If you succeed in school, you have turned against your race. It's depressing to stand in front of 60 kids a day and know that the majority of them will drop out, get pregnant before the age of 18, join a gang, become a drug-dealer, end up in prison, and/or get shot. Some of them may actually graduate and attend college, maybe 10 out of the 60. I plan lessons and attempt to teach my students to think, problem solve, and find a purpose for getting their education. What I've found is that you can't teach people anything if they don't want to learn. I can present the information, but what they do with it (if they even hear it) is beyond my control. As long as their role models rap and talk about anti-education and ghetto fabulous living, my teaching is in vain.

Hopefully, the people that see the problem and want to fix the problem will yell louder than those who choose to victimize or be victims. However, people will continue to carry torches to burn those that say racial slurs instead of tackling the underbelly of the problem, which is the value system of the culture. Dealing with the real problem is more involved than making posters and marching. To begin solving the problem people need to look at: Who is leading the black race? Who is setting the examples? Where are positive role models for these children? As long as the role models slam education and promote gangster living, the problems will continue and the victim cycle will go for generations to come.

__________________
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I heard you sold it

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