Unacceptable

         In the book There Are No Children Here by Alex Kotlowitz, we get a heartbreakingly detailed account of what life in Chicago’s Henry Horner Homes is like. In class we discussed the positives and negatives of gang presence in the projects. Obviously, the cons far outweigh the pros in this case, but it got me thinking…in the projects, are gangs a necessary evil? I mean, there are abysmal resources available to the residents, individuals and families have very little money to live on, people are displaced, and there is basically no legal protection or security provided to the community. The combination of these parts as well as the complete lack of compassion provided by people who could actually help in some meaningful way takes the projects down a sad road that could really only lead to bad people in community leadership roles. I’m confident that many people consider the projects to be a lost cause because there appears to be no way to fix it. Judging by the continued messed up state of affairs in the projects, I’m guessing politicians and the like have all but given up on finding real ways to improve the quality of life of the residents of these communities. It seems obvious that if no one is going to give a flying F about these residents, why wouldn’t a gang capitalize on the job opportunity and run the place? And people wonder why gangs are such a problem…It’s no mystery: there was a giant lack of sound leadership and support for the community so gangs stepped in to fill those roles.

         While reading the book, I kept thinking how crazy it is that the kids live in such a scary places and the projects have to be one of the absolute worst places to grow up. http://www.businessinsider.com/chicago-is-the-worst-american-city-2013-6#. It seems impossible not to reflect on my own childhood and how protected I was from the terrible stuff that went and continues to go down just an hour from where I lived. We also discussed the police presence at Henry Horner Homes, or lack thereof. Obviously, there has to be a happy medium for police patrol between absolutely nothing like in white areas, and complete bombardment in black neighborhoods. At the time the book was written, the police must have been too scared to patrol in the projects and that’s probably a reason why crime was at such a devastatingly high level. I really think that the people who should care and can do something to help improve the lives of people living in crime-ridden, impoverished neighborhoods housing a largely minority population, absolutely do not care. Many years ago I heard a white man say that people who live in ghettos want to live there so they “can be around their own kind.” Clearly that man never read There Are No Children Here because the people described in the book are doing more existing than they are actually living.

 I don’t have answers to the problems that occur in the settings like in our book, however, it seems to me that people could stand to see the devastating situation more clearly for what it is and recognize that there are children living in these toxic environments, children who grow up constantly worrying where their next meal will come from (or they don’t eat at all), who can’t walk around their own neighborhood or be in their own home without being hyper-aware that they might be shot at or killed at any moment. As far as I know, I don’t personally know anyone that would wish harm on a child and that could be where the poverty problem finally resonates. These kids are out there living a tougher life than many of us will ever know, and they’re just kids. And pity won’t cut it, that’s the last thing people need is pity. The problem needs to hit home with everyone. We need to have people life-swap for a month, maybe more, so that individuals can get a taste of how others live and find some personal motivation for change. Or maybe I’m crazy to think that things can change for the better. I absolutely think we could live in a country where no child has to worry about not making it to their teenage years just because they happened to be born into disadvantage. I’m not going to lie, the older I get (and I feel like a Cotton Top just typing those words) the less I feel people truly give a damn about their fellow human. It was mentioned in class that this book is a downer, but holy crap is it authentic and indispensable reading.