Monday, April 1, 2013

The Conversation

Los Angeles, California. Home of the palm trees, cool breeze, and beach. There is basically two seasons. Beach weather and weather that people on the east coast would still consider beach weather. However, there is a side to LA that most people do not quite know too much about. The side that they only hear about through music and/or movies. Both reasons why other races love us and fear us at the same time.

Why do I feel like I was born onto a battle field of a war which had begun long before I arrived. A war where as a result, countless of lives have been lost. This is not a war of the kind experienced by my Iranian brothers where missiles are liable to fly over head at any time, but it is of the nature where I am liable to die walking down the street if I am unconscious of my personal color coordination or from a baseball hat ordained with a team not favored in that particular neighborhood. My sophomore year in high school I remember getting off the bus at Crenshaw High School at a time when two local gangs were in a murder contest and had to hide behind a car in a parking lot so that I would not become the victim of a drive-by. In another incident, me and a group of my friends were robbed at gun point for our cell phones.

To make matters worse, those we hire to protect and serve often act as catalysts for the perpetual hatred. At the age of 16,  me and a friend of mine were pulled over driving home from a workout in an area that was known for gang violence.  I forgot my ID at home, something which at the time was irrelevant to me. He asked me what was I doing in the area as if I needed a reason. He asked me where I lived and searched my address in the computer. He saw that I did not live too far.  The officers congregated by their car, put me in handcuffs, told me that I fit the description of someone that committed a robbery (black, 5'10-6'2), and told my friend to drive away. This is an old tactic. This is what the cop actually translated to us by the series of questions to me. I was wearing a blue hat in area that was inhabited by a gang whose primary colors were red ("what are you doing over here?").  My address was going to specify if I was either a predator or bait. If I lived too far away from the area, they would've thought I was there to violate a rival gangs territory (No, I was playing basketball), and if I lived in the neighborhood then they know that the spectrum of colors that I simply thought were stylish would provoke violence from the local inhabiters of the neighborhood. The answer was B. So, the fact that I did not have my ID gave them an opportunity to take advantage of the situation. He told my friend to drive away, which translates to make sure that you go far enough away to where they can no longer see you, but you can see them. The cops then drove me a block away, got me out of the car, unlocked the hand cuffs, and told me to walk home. This translates to, we have no current intentions of personally harassing you, but we know that because of your attire you are liable to get jumped walking through this neighborhood to get home.

Fast forward 5 years. I get accepted to USC as a transfer student. I went to 2 different colleges prior to attending USC. I finally feel as though "I made it" although I have not physically left my Los Angeles dwelling.  Long story short, me and my roommates throw a party after the first home of the season in 2011 and I get shot in the chest by a gentlemen who had the bright idea to steal from our homes. These are just a few accounts many from my time growing up in "Killer Cali." It is very possible that I could just have bad luck, but I as well as many others know that this is not true. It is a common story of most African-Americans, especially black males who grow up in these hostile environments. I made it to USC and still almost lost my life. Most others who are not as fortunate simply adapt to the lifestyle out of pure survival. Others do it because media and their reality tells them that it is a part of their culture and "normal."

This is not a justification, but an explanation of a point of view from a guy with an abstract mind who grew up in a concrete jungle. Where those who make it out have had to battle with being different, duck for cover, and mentally overcome their environments just to make it to the same places that our counterparts have been blessed to receive without having to grow up so fast. This is not to say that every African-American has it bad, is bad, that I had it the worst, or that other races and creeds do not have their own issues.  This is just my addition to a conversation that has yet to be had. Maybe this conversation will cause someone to look at me for me instead of a criminal. Or if not a criminal, without the innate skepticism that is to be had for the black race.

I was told by a gentlemen heavily intoxicated by the cheapest of liquors that I do not belong at this institution and that I took the place of someone who was more capable. "If it wasn't for that Affirmative Action!" he said. I could nothing more than laugh at the situation, because it would've taken me an entire semester with ample resources for me to get him to understand the blaze that me and my cohorts have risen from; our stories strikingly similar as we cope with our new life at a predominantly white institution.

I hope that this conversation continues. I would like to hear other people's stories also, because this is what produces substantial change...








4 comments:

  1. Beautifully told. I too transferred to USC, from LACC; community college was kind of an amazing funhouse mirror that showed me so many aspects of my own privilege that I wasn't even aware of. At the start, I'm embarrassed to admit that I thought I was above it. And then I met these amazing scholars, people who are so smart and academically gifted, but who are undocumented immigrants who came here as children. Or students like Nuha, the black Muslim woman from the Sudan, who has several advanced engineering degrees that are simply not recognized here - so she started at the bottom, with grace and humility that both shamed and inspired me. I started to notice how when I ride the train, the transit cops never bother to check my ticket, or how when people talk about affirmative action, they usually do not mean, say, legacy admissions. Excellent post, there is quite a lot here to think about and unpack.

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  2. First off, I appreciate you being so open in effort to spark a much needed conversation. You've touched on a number of important points, but I am particularly struck by your story of getting shot at a USC party as it brings attention to the relationship the university has with its immediate community. USC has made a number of attempts to connect with its neighbors--e.g. The Good Neighbors Campaign, Friends and Neighbors Service Days, and USC Family of Five Schools. However, in its attempt to "protect" its students through building a wrap-around fence, the university is simultaneously breaking the connections it seeks to foster with the community. The building of the fence is symbolic, communicating an "us vs. them" sort of mentality. I believe that combating the issues you've identified requires that we come together as a community to create comprehensive solutions. The fence that USC has built has prevented the university from being able to build such relationships, and by extension such solutions.

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  3. Wow, very powerful post. Recently, I read an article (http://la.streetsblog.org/2013/04/30/a-tale-of-two-communities-new-security-measures-at-usc-intensify-profiling-of-lower-income-youth-of-color/#more-82106) about the ways that DPS “protects our community,” which often includes harassing innocent inhabitants of the neighborhood, much like those police officers did to you. DPS frequently stop random young black or Latino kids on the street, asking them “what are you doing? What are you doing here? What you got on you?” even regularly stopping black USC students and asking them the same questions. With increased pressure on USC to provide a safe experience for their students in light of recent incidents, DPS and LAPD step out of line in their racial profiling and harassment of regular, innocent people. Like Rachel, I’m white and haven’t experienced anything like you have, and it’s really eye opening to hear about the extremes to which police go to “protect the neighborhood” or really, to flex their muscles and exercise their power over others.

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  4. I appreciate the honesty in your post. At USC, it is always nice to learn about people’s backgrounds and remember that not everyone here comes from gated communities and elite private high schools. I think that what a lot of people forget is that higher education is a privilege that not everyone can afford and that education is what you make it. My mother paid her way through a community college while my dad went to a top ranked university similar to USC. Yet they both ended up working for the same company. It is easy to get caught up in the wealth of USC and forget about the great opportunities we have here and how fortunate we are to be receiving an education, yet alone to be receiving from such a top ranked university.

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