Last year 27 youth under the age of 20 died in the UK as a result of gun and knife crime.
Twenty seven! What the heck? That’s over two a month. And for what? Looking at someone wrong. Turfs over territory. Misplaced bravado. Damn, I really wish I had some answers.
I work with schools, colleges and connexions with students who will not dare walk too far from home or “their endz” as they call it. They suggest it is stupid for the police to expect youth to follow through with amnesties and hand in guns and knives. Many readily admit some of the crime is directly related to drug culture although this is often covered over by a media which wants to seem politically correct. I wish I had some answers.
It’s easy to blame absent fathers, poverty, gangsta rap, materialism but man I am scratching my brain for some answers. Most rap is listened to by non black purchasers. Many social groups survive even with poverty and absent fathers. Poverty and the desire for materialism is something that also plagues Bengali and white working class youth in London yet we don’t see the same kind of death rates as witnessed in the Afro Caribbean community. Injuries yes. Death rates. No. I wish I had some answers.
The thing is so many youth want to get out of it. They suggest that even those of us who have a hands on interest in solving this can’t get in because there is way too much ignorance, codes of silence and basically for many no other option for survival. I can’t lie I wish I had answers. This is hurting man. It is really hurting and for a brief moment today I felt really helpless. But you know what. I have faith. For Nathan Foster, for Rhys Jones, for James Smarrt Ford, for Danielle Johnson and Sian Simpson, for all those others who lost their lives and the many others who injured by gun crime, we continue to look for answers. Never giving up. Having a flicker if not a flame in the power of the human spirit.
Filed under: Uncategorized , Rant
Like you David I sometimes feel that this situation is hopeless. But just as the young people know what they don’t want they should be consulted – in a meaningful way – about how it might change. How to do that? I don’t know ( yet). But I guess for many the idea of someone who can make decisions – who is in “power” – listening to what they have to say might be laughable.
Jackie