“I only ask of God, that he won’t let me be indifferent to the suffering.” This is the first line of the song “Solo le Pido a Dios” (I Only Ask of God) that was written by Argentinian Folk Musician, Leon Gieco. It was Gieco’s response to the violence taking place in Argentina during the 1970s that many in the country ignored for far too long.
During the current rise of violence in District of Columbia that line has come to my mind hundreds of times.
As a community activist in D.C. for more than 20 years, I have seen numerous murders of young men I have known and loved — each one was a meaningless loss of life. Over that same time span, thousands of other humans were murdered throughout D.C..
Granted that my life’s work — I run a non-profit that focuses on D.C. youth — puts me closer to this reality than many of my white friends and neighbors. Our city’s violence and death is the daily work conversation that comes home with me. But it can’t stay with just me, each of these victims has a story and that story should be told.
I recently had lunch with a friend who owns a successful business, and is an amazing ally — he hires local citizens returning from prison, he gives second chances to young men who just need to catch a break to get back on their feet; he provides economic pathways away from the streets, and helps many of the same young men that have gone through my program.
Like me he is a tattooed, white, Gen-Xer who has lived in D.C. for more than 25 years. Over lunch the two of us had an honest, frank and sometimes brutal conversation about homicides in D.C. that bumped into familiar and uncomfortable ground including topics such as: black men killing other black men; questioning where the black political and religious leaders are and why they are not talking about this; the assumption that most murders are neighborhood gang beefs gone badly; D.C.’s old guard vs. the new D.C.; Gentrification; Racism.
The conversation went on for hours. It made both of us think about our experiences in the early 1980s and 90s. Back then D.C. was known as the “Murder Capital” to the rest of the United States, a moniker that has been hard to shake and an era that shapes many of the perspectives to violence in D.C. today.
That was a truly difficult conversation, but one that is necessary in many parts of the city. Because the question isn’t really where are the black leaders? The question is where are all of us?
We all need a true honest look at our own lives and how each of us fit into this crisis, because these are all our children, these are all our streets, ‘East of the River’ to ‘West of The park’ this is our city, and this is our problem.
I walked away from that conversation with a scary thought; has the number of homicides in D.C., counting them and comparing them with years past has made us cold to murder?
I am afraid that we have become too detached from the horror of homicide.
I understand that in D.C. people have crazy work weeks, busy schedules for our children; trying to find time for our friends and family, most people in D.C. don’t have time/power/energy to make sense of something that is so senseless. But my underlining fear is that many residents don’t identify with victims of murder because we don’t know them or we don’t go to “that part of town.” Much the same way we can block out or ignore a story about a ferry boat capsizing in Bangladesh.
Many people — as a coping mechanism — assume that most of the murders we hear about on the local news are gang or drug related so the victim’s death shouldn’t really come to us as a shock.
Thus we avoid the basic questions of who was this person and why were they murdered?
D.C. didn’t get to a place where human life is so devalued overnight. We are all going to have to dig deep and make some real commitments to future generations from every neighborhood if we want to change our city’s culture when it comes to violence. The city has changed leaps and bounds over the last 20 years, but D.C. cannot coffee-shop its way away from the tragedy in our streets.
I know many people are waiting for the easy answer as to ‘why’ this is happening. I also know that many people in D.C. are waiting for Mayor Muriel Bowser, Chief Cathy Lanier and other public officials to wave a magic want and end the killings. But the hard truth is this is not about “all hands on deck” for the Metropolitan Police Department. This is “all hands on deck” for the entire city. We need a comprehensive approach to murder reduction, prevention to intervention, enforcement and rehabilitation, that is all part of an entangled web of housing opportunities, mental health access and substance abuse treatment.
But in my experience working with young people in D.C. there are only two ways to stop a bullet: an education or a job. These are the true vaccines for violence.
In the long game, we need to make a extensive commitment to make sure that every child in D.C. has equal opportunity to a quality education in the community in where they live, regardless of their social class, gender, race, ethnicity, or disability. That is not a quick fix in D.C.
Moreover, we need true career path training for youth who slip through the cracks. We cannot wait until they are in COSA (parole) and are forced to enter a job training program. No one should have to go to prison to find easy access to career path training. Career training is preventive medicine.
But most importantly if we really want to end violence in our streets- empathy is the first step in bringing down the number of homicides. Lets us not be in insensitive to the cries of others in our D.C.
I only ask of God, that he won’t let me be indifferent to the suffering.
