For years, we have been told by everyone who speaks about crime in the Black community that it has to do with poverty. I’ve always been hesitant to buy into that 100 percent, because I was raised in Cabrini with some of the poorest Black folks there were. And we did not have any of the kind of crime that we see today occur back then. Part of the reason, is that folks had genuine morals. We were a community and there were standards and expectations that everyone had to live up to.
For the past couple of weeks, I’ve written about how Shanquella Robinson was viciously set up and murdered, allegedly by six of her so-called friends. As I’ve been following the tidbits of information that have been flowing out over the internet, including watching a reporter go up to the front door of several of the individuals allegedly involved in the crime and subsequently ring their doorbell trying to get them to answer, I noticed that these were not individuals who came from some poverty-stricken ghetto neighborhoods. They lived in middle-class homes and had gone to college with Shanquella, and yet the lure of alleged criminal activity still permeated their world.
Why is there such a propensity for crime coming out of the diaspora of the black community? That is a question I need those who can analyze it to answer. Just this past week up in Milwaukee, a 10-year-old boy allegedly shot and killed his mother because she would not allow him to buy an expensive virtual reality headset. Reportedly, the boy initially gave police one version of how he allegedly accidentally shot his mother and was placed with relatives. However, when the relatives began to suspect that the boy wasn’t telling the entire truth, they called the police to come get him. The boy changed his story and the police charged him as an adult. It is rare to charge a 10-year-old as an adult, and the juvenile justice system is not prepared to deal with heinous crimes committed by children. The details of the case make it sound like it was premeditated, which is even scarier, especially when you consider that the security cameras all around the house were reportedly, mysteriously off that morning. And the boy the next day, while staying with relatives, allegedly used his mother’s account and ordered the headsets anyway.
Chicago needs to have a day, then a couple of days, then a week, and then a month without a single heinous killing. I truly believe we are in a copycat mindset. CPD is understaffed and overwhelmed with the amount of crime going on. And the crime is at all different levels. There seems to be a general attitude of “why should I follow the law when others don’t?” flowing through this city.
We need to return to an error where criminal behavior is the rarity and not the normality.
