22 January 2019, Chicago, Illinois, USA
“So last night I couldn't sleep, and it wasn't because we don't have heat. We just heat the house with the oven. Not having heat on my block, that's regular stuff. I still couldn't sleep last night.
And it wasn't because I heard gunshots. I hear gun shots all the time. I tell myself they're firecrackers, I go back to sleep. Hearing gunshots on my block, that's regular stuff.
I still couldn't sleep last night.
It wasn't even because I saw helicopters. Helicopters fly above my house all the time. They fly in threes. When they go up and down, they float like dragonflies. Rattle the house. It still wasn't why I couldn't sleep.
I couldn't sleep because the lights from the helicopters were shining through my window at 3:00 AM. They had the whole block lit up. You could see every bullet casing on the ground at 3:00 AM, and I couldn't sleep because of it.
I live in a house with my aunt and her husband. Both of them are drug addicts. Nobody says that where I'm from, that's regular stuff.
The last time I seen my aunt, she came into the house. She had a black T-shirt on with a Batman logo on her chest. Actually half of her ear was missing. She got into a fight with a drug addict outside and she laid on the kitchen floor bleeding. It's the last time I've seen her, a couple of weeks back.
My house is ran by my older cousins, both of them are in gangs. They sell drugs, but that's regular stuff. We don't say we're in gangs where I'm from. We say ‘this is my set, these are my friends. I'm a product of my environment. I'm a victim of my circumstances. I'm in the trenches’, it's regular stuff.
I don't care what none of you all say though. I love my cousins. I love my older cousins, and I love them because they tell me I'm smart! They say I would be the next Nino Brown and my teachers don't say I was smart. My cousins, they say I'm smart because I'm the lookout. I know every car that's supposed to be on my block.
There's nine of them. I know it's a Chevy with a black 10, baby blue Cadillac, van with the curtains in it, the man with the motorcycle, the royal blue Acura. There's a Toyota Camry with a city college bumper sticker, there's a lady with a Cherokee, there's all black Charger with silver rims, and there's a brown Honda minivan. Any car pulls up that not one of those nine I say, "Look out, there's danger."
They say I'm smart because I'm the look out on the block.
I order my breakfast every morning at the corner store. I order it through three inch bulletproof glass windows that has mugshots of black faces on it. The windows are so thick I got to yell my order. I said, "Hey man, I want the Doritos. No, I don't want the spicy Nacho. I want the Cool Ranch, the blue bag, the blue bag, the blue bag!." And the guy goes to get it, drops my Doritos in a bulletproof glass jar and he slides it out to me like I'm an inmate in solitary confinement. I'm in the real world though. ShotSpotter sit on top of holes listening to gunshots, blue lights are flashing, boarded up businesses for blocks? Man, if society was a person I wouldn't think society trusted me, so I steal anyway.
I'm looking forward to going to school today, I guess, because I'm a part of the afterschool programme. It's ran by this guy named Jahmal Cole. Jahmal is always telling us that he can't afford to take us to China, so he takes us to Chinatown. He can't afford to take us to Poland, so he takes us to Jefferson Park. He can't afford to take us to India, so he takes us to Divine Avenue. Jahmal is always saying we can travel the world without leaving Chicago. And just last week, Jahmal took us downtown and we went to a museum. But the coolest part wasn't the museum, no. The coolest part was I've never seen anybody wait for a taxi before. And Jahmal let us all get out, we're waiting for a taxi and got to ride a few blocks. I thought that was pretty dope.
Hey, I was telling Jahmal, I don't like to go see my dad. He just got out of jail, he's on house arrest. Every time I see him, he's sending me on errands. But I noticed when my mom posted a picture of her new boyfriend on Facebook, my dad liked that picture. But when my mom posted a picture on Facebook of me having a 3.5 GPA, my dad never liked that picture. That bothered me.”
Hello, my name is Jahmal Cole. I thought it was important to start off and tell that story because the more we're separated as a city, the less empathy we have for each other.
And that when most people hear about something negative happening in another Chicago community, especially where people are a lot different from them, it might as well happen in another country. Well, when you visit different communities and you interact with the residents, it could change all that.
I grew up in a household where all three of my older cousins and brothers, one doing 80 years in Statesville, 40 years, 20 years, same house, man.
And I'll write my brothers, I write my cousins. I always write them by hand, so they know I still love them, you know what I mean? And I ask them, how is it in the Statesville? My older cousin told me, he said, Jamal, you know what? On my block, because in jails it's blocks, A block, B block, C block. He said on my block I'm not in jail with any paedophiles. There's no rapist where I'm at. I'm in here with guys that have sold a little drugs, racketeering, armed robbery, regular stuff. He really said regular shit, you know what I mean? But man, it got me thinking.
It's not regular for German shepherds to be sniffing kids on 79th street.
It's not regular for helicopters to be landing on top of people's houses at night.
It's not regular to have to order your breakfast through bulletproof glass windows every day.
If you all just ate your quiche through a bulletproof glass window right now, you'll be traumatised.
It's not regular to walk inside of a Walgreens and all the costs be locked up. It's not regular for all the billboards in my community to promote cheap divorces and $6,000 tax advances.
All right? It's not regular, man. It's not regular for there to be 15 currency exchanges and no banks. How am I supposed to save?
It's not regular for there to be a liquor store in every other corner. I might as well get drunk!
It's not regular for there to be a holding cell in the basement of a funeral home.
It's not regular for there to be two petty wagons parked outside in front of my high school. That's not regular.
It's not regular for 80% of the kids in my program to know somebody that's been murdered, but only 10% of the kids in my program know somebody that's been to college.
That stuff is not regular. And they say it's regular, they say that I work with at risk youth. Man, the integrity of this city is at risk. If we're not supporting programs like My Block, My Hood, My City.
I want to thank Mayor Emmanuel for the Champion of Freedom Award. I want to thank you all for coming. I want to thank my board, but there aint no freedom on 79th and Cottage, man. It's just the Happy's Liquors. There aint no freedom on Roosevelt and Pulaski. It's just the Mitchell PCS and the bulletproof glass. Freedom without equity is not freedom. That's just a struggle.
Oppression is super real you all. It's a structural part of this country in its history, it was created intentionally. And nowadays it's cloaked up in trumped up laws and false media and we have a hard time recognising how injustice is being sustained.
It's not regular to see the cheap divorce signs, man. It's not regular.
So I want to thank you guys for coming out and I want to charge you with supporting organisations like My Block, My Hood, My City, you can do that easily. You can text message Explore to 55222 and you can sponsor one of our kids to go through our programme for a year. Again, that's Explore at 55222 because it's cool to say, "Oh great speech, great speech." I need support! It's hard to take all these kids around the city. So I charge you guys. If you really want to make a difference text message Explore to 55222 and see how you can get involved.
Dr. Martin Luther King said, "In a real sense all life is interrelated." He says, "All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, bound by a single garment of destiny." He says, "What affects one person directly affects all of us indirectly." He said, "I can't be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can't be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be." That's the interrelated structure of reality.
In this interconnected Chicago that I envision, all 77 community areas need to contribute to the music in the city. The residents of Humboldt Park, they're going to play the timpani, the residents of the Gold Coast, they going to play the cymbals. The residents of Woodlawn will playing with xylophones and Chatham, you're going to play the bass drums. We got the most bucket boys in the city. It just makes sense.
Hey, the point is all 77 community areas contributes to the music of the city. And if one community is struggling and can't play their part, the entire piece is going to suffer and we're all going to be concerned. Thank you guys.
To book Jahmal as a speaker visit his site. To support a kid at My Block, My Hood, My City
Jahmal Cole is a guest on episode 31 of the podcast