By: Miranda Jones
Hate Out of Winston/http://www.hateoutofws.org
Yesterday there was a rally in which Sheriff Bobby Kimbrough and many other speakers, some activists, urged residents in Winston Salem and Forsyth County to stop the violence. Stop the violence has become a common refrain even though America is a country mired in violence and born in violence. According to the Winston Salem Journal, Sheriff Kimbrough went on to deride community members saying, “If you are not going to donate your time, your treasure or even your prayers … if you are not going to bring solutions, I want you to get out of the way.” Kimbrough said, “I want you to sit down. We are losing too many children. We are losing too many lives.” “What I am seeing today is frightening — to have a shooting in a public school,” the sheriff said. “When I see everything that is happening in our community: Where is the damn outrage?”
Hate Out of Winston has been outraged. Our outrage has been with the system and systemic oppression and not with the oppressed. We assert that our sheriff’s victim-blaming was not only reckless but was irresponsible. For starters, the event was held in the crown jewel of Winston-Salem-its downtown. The event was not held where those who feel the effects of violence live. How silly to hold a “rally” in cushy Winston Salem with a beautiful backdrop of a waterfall and nice steps, which makes for a nice photo op by the way, where the city has invested billions of dollars instead of investing in the most marginalized and oppressed people who are most at risk for gun and gang violence. Additionally, to ask community members and activists to do the work of repair instead of asking the power structure and power brokers to allocate resources is unfathomable. It is easy to play verbal target practice with the victims and activists yet demand nothing from the rest of the electorate. Maybe that just won’t result in the white vote during the next election cycle.
Similarly, there was the trope of “black on black” violence. Al Jabbar, president of the local Winston Salem NAACP, was quoted as praising Black Lives Matter but then stated, “I want Black Lives Matter to be on the streets when we are killing one another, speaking out against it,” he said. While the sounding brass and tinkling cymbal rhetoric of “Black on Black’’ crime may make many feel good, it is offensive and its origins are “rooted in America’s racist legacy and meant to demean Black people as criminally inclined…and there no conversation about “white-on-white” crime,” (Source: Lynn, 2020). Hate Out contends that this highly racialized political trope could have negative effects for Black students, especially Black male students in the local school system, even if unintentionally.
The comments have the potential to worsen the crisis of the criminalization of Black male students, pushing this same demographic into suspension or Title 1 schools as well as further militarization of law enforcement against Black youth. According to the Winston-Salem Journal August 11th edition in Winston-Salem Forsyth County Schools, “Black students were five times more likely than white students to get suspended and Black students with a disability were three times more likely to get suspended than other students with a disability between 2017–19.” The comments from yesterday could give rise to the rhetoric of the Black male “super predator” because one Black teenager, who like all teenagers’ frontal lobe isn’t fully developed, made the decision to take an outside conflict into a predominately white school. They also can lead to making schools into prisons laced with metal detectors, which may only further the school-to-prison pipeline for Black children. In fact, according to WestEd Justice & Prevention Center:
“While metal detectors may provide a visible response to concerns about school safety, there is little evidence to support their effectiveness at preventing school shootings or successfully detecting weapons at schools. Metal detectors also are expensive to purchase, staff, and maintain. Equally concerning are potential unintended negative consequences associated with the use of metal detectors. Students in schools with metal detectors, which typically are schools with greater proportions of students of color, are more likely to perceive violence and disorder and less likely to feel safe than students in schools without metal detectors. School districts that are considering the use of metal detectors, especially those that are considering using metal detectors in lieu of funding other prevention efforts, such as increased access to mental and behavioral health services should consider this range of evidence,” (Source: Schildkraut and Kathryn Grogan, 2019).
Added to this maelstrom was the mention of a lack of parental guidance, often referred to as absentee fathers, but no commentary on the role of the carceral state which disproportionately locks up Black men, and the policing state that often kills them unjustly. There was also no mention of the systemic racism that is so pervasive and can be felt right in Winston-Salem with its tale of two cities. Additionally, references were made around food scarcity which is indeed factual since “49.7% of Black residents in Winston-Salem have low or no access to healthy food. Not only that but over 20 food deserts exist in Winston-Salem, concentrated primarily on the east side of town.
In these communities facing food insecurity, redlining and institutional racism are at the roots of the problem,” (Source: Berryman, Redlining and Racism — the Real Roots of Food Deserts in our Communities/2020). Our city remains committed to its poverty thought forces and studies that don’t seem to produce very much by way of outcomes. Whether or not there has been any real action is questionable beyond its long list of recommendations. (Source: Winston-Salem Poverty Thought Force, 2016). In the words of Historian and professor of history, race and public policy at Harvard Kennedy School, Khalil Gibran Muhammad, “Black people didn’t get economic investment. They got more policing and more prisons,” (Lynn, 2020).
So back to the sheriff’s question of where is the outrage? Our outrage lies with systems and powerbrokers. Failing schools, lack of adequate housing, over-incarceration of Black men and women, overinvestment in downtown, overinvestment in law enforcement, lack of mental health services for the poor, criminalization of Black youth…you get the picture. Because a young man took violence to a predominately white side of town, we are asking ourselves what will those closed-door conversations look like. How many Black children will pay the price for this very unfortunate incident? Will the lines be redrawn so the accusation of racism falls flat? Who will respond to the property owners and engaged parents?
We understand that it is easy to be adversarial for the sake of being adversarial. We understand that politicians often use far-left activists as political fodder for votes. The best of both worlds understand how very necessary it is to work together. After all, Sheriff Kimbrough has stated that we are better together. If this is true, we offer the following suggestions:
- Offer mental health services in schools led by Black & Brown mental health clinicians
- Offer anti-gang prevention programs in local public schools & fund them.
- Avoid metal detectors in schools as the research suggests they are ineffective and costly.
- Extend hours in which local recreation centers and schools are open & compensate staff persons.
- Recruit mentors from Black led grassroots organizations who are already doing youth justice work. Some exemplars are Lit City, the 10,000 Fearless and Beating Up Bad Habits
- Investigate how youth are able to obtain guns from gangs to crime to loop holes in gun show.
- Allow pediatricians to ask about firearms in patients are age 3 and up
- Fund a Black led rites of passage group that works in Black schools within the Black school to build rapport and trust with Black students and helps facilitate wraparound services.
Lastly, we understand the need for people to just do something. We understand the need for knee-jerk reactions. We understand the need for children, parents, and educators to feel safe. After all, schools should be safe places. What we know is that an overreach could have disastrous and unintended consequences all due to one incident. We anticipate that the next school board meeting will be rife with the same parents who always attend, those with access, privilege, and power. What about those who don’t? What about those who can’t? What about those for whom power has always been a threat? If we are better together, let’s make sure that rhetoric and the decisions consider all that happens before children ever reach the school grounds.
