Ruben Salazar Honored with New US Stamp
Today the US Postal Service introduced a new stamp honoring Chicano journalist and activist Ruben Salazar. Salazar was the sole voice in mainstream media for Chicanos in the 1960s. He was a reporter for the LA Times and later worked for Spanish-language KMEX-TV. On August 29, 1970, while covering the Chicano Moratorium Against the Vietnam War in East LA – the largest anti-war demonstration in a community of color at the time – Salazar was killed while seated in the Silver Dollar Bar on Whittier Boulevard. Reportedly sheriff's deputies had fired a tear gas canister into the curtained entrance and struck Salazar in the head.
The 30,000-person demonstration turned into a riot that lasted several days when sheriff's deputies attacked the largely peaceful crowd at Laguna Park (now called Salazar Park). Hundreds were arrested, hundreds injured, and a handful of people were killed, including Ruben Salazar (community reports that more were killed never made the main media outlets).
I'm pleased this stamp has been issued in honor of this courageous leader and writer. I was in the Hall of Justice Jail's "murderer's row" (next to a cell with Charles Manson) when we received news of Salazar's death on the radio. A lightweight riot ensued on our tier, mostly a couple of burned mattresses & rattling of bars with metal objects, which ended when the smoke got too thick for us to do anything else. I was there because I had been arrested early on in the Chicano Moratorium. Deputies separated the cholo gangsters, and a few of us were threatened with murder linked to those the deputies had killed (thus our stint on murderer's row). Of course, in the end they couldn't charge us with any of this.
This event and others like it in the 1960s and 1970s helped politicize a number of us into community study groups, organizing, and, in my case, life-long revolutionary work.
The stamp, however, is appearing in a particularly hard time with many actions against Mexicans – covered up as “anti-illegal immigrant” activities — around the country. For example, many cities have instituted ordinances against manufacturers and landlords who hire or rent to undocumented people. A US east coast city has even barred Latinos who speak Spanish from using their beach. A Florida city, Avon Park, with the motto of “The City of Charm,” two years ago instituted the “Illegal Immigration Relief Act,” with one business owner saying, “[undocumented immigrants] have been working here for practically nothing and taking away the white jobs. If they don't want to speak English and play by the rules then they shouldn't be here.”
Statements like this underscore the racist nature of many of these laws targeting “illegal immigrants” (a non-official term that is also racist, although widely used in the media). Let's call this what it is. For example, a Colorado legislator on April 21 was ordered to leave the podium of the state's assembly because he called Mexicans “illiterate peasants.” I'm glad some people in the Colorado legislative body can spot this for what it is. In North Carolina there are reports of increased robberies striking at Spanish-speaking communities.
Even murders and physical attacks against alleged undocumented Mexicans have been on the rise. Here are some recent examples: In Ohio, an entire Mexican family was murdered after racist arsonists set fire to their apartment in September of 2004. In the same state last December four Mexican workers were found stabbed to death in a sparse apartment (police say robbery was not the motive since $1,300 was not taken, money believed saved by the workers to send to Mexico). And in February of 2004, a Mexican mother and her 19-year-old daughter were bludgeoned to death early one morning that witnesses say was done by a “white” male in his early 20s who ran into a car with at least three men in it and sped off. Many other murders and attacks against Mexican immigrants (some of whom had documents) continue to be reported.
As much as the “anti-illegal immigrant” movement claims it's not racist, you don't see attacks like these against Canadians or Europeans who are in this country without papers (yes, there are some). The US government is in league with this, unfortunately. Besides a rise in immigration raids, they continue working on a 700-mile border wall at a cost of billions of dollars, even though this may break about 35 environmental laws (who's the lawless now?).
Ruben Salazar deserves more attention and respect. We have a long way to go for equitable and just treatment of the poor, the dark skinned, the immigrant. Salazar was part of this struggle. We must continue to make this country truly free and truly fair. The “anti-illegal immigrant” movement is largely a throwback to Jim Crow and the Black Codes.
And remember: I'm on KJLH-FM, 102.3 "Front Page" talk show this week with Dominique Di Prima from 4:30 AM to 6 AM. Tune in if you can.
c/s
Read more
The 30,000-person demonstration turned into a riot that lasted several days when sheriff's deputies attacked the largely peaceful crowd at Laguna Park (now called Salazar Park). Hundreds were arrested, hundreds injured, and a handful of people were killed, including Ruben Salazar (community reports that more were killed never made the main media outlets).
I'm pleased this stamp has been issued in honor of this courageous leader and writer. I was in the Hall of Justice Jail's "murderer's row" (next to a cell with Charles Manson) when we received news of Salazar's death on the radio. A lightweight riot ensued on our tier, mostly a couple of burned mattresses & rattling of bars with metal objects, which ended when the smoke got too thick for us to do anything else. I was there because I had been arrested early on in the Chicano Moratorium. Deputies separated the cholo gangsters, and a few of us were threatened with murder linked to those the deputies had killed (thus our stint on murderer's row). Of course, in the end they couldn't charge us with any of this.
This event and others like it in the 1960s and 1970s helped politicize a number of us into community study groups, organizing, and, in my case, life-long revolutionary work.
The stamp, however, is appearing in a particularly hard time with many actions against Mexicans – covered up as “anti-illegal immigrant” activities — around the country. For example, many cities have instituted ordinances against manufacturers and landlords who hire or rent to undocumented people. A US east coast city has even barred Latinos who speak Spanish from using their beach. A Florida city, Avon Park, with the motto of “The City of Charm,” two years ago instituted the “Illegal Immigration Relief Act,” with one business owner saying, “[undocumented immigrants] have been working here for practically nothing and taking away the white jobs. If they don't want to speak English and play by the rules then they shouldn't be here.”
Statements like this underscore the racist nature of many of these laws targeting “illegal immigrants” (a non-official term that is also racist, although widely used in the media). Let's call this what it is. For example, a Colorado legislator on April 21 was ordered to leave the podium of the state's assembly because he called Mexicans “illiterate peasants.” I'm glad some people in the Colorado legislative body can spot this for what it is. In North Carolina there are reports of increased robberies striking at Spanish-speaking communities.
Even murders and physical attacks against alleged undocumented Mexicans have been on the rise. Here are some recent examples: In Ohio, an entire Mexican family was murdered after racist arsonists set fire to their apartment in September of 2004. In the same state last December four Mexican workers were found stabbed to death in a sparse apartment (police say robbery was not the motive since $1,300 was not taken, money believed saved by the workers to send to Mexico). And in February of 2004, a Mexican mother and her 19-year-old daughter were bludgeoned to death early one morning that witnesses say was done by a “white” male in his early 20s who ran into a car with at least three men in it and sped off. Many other murders and attacks against Mexican immigrants (some of whom had documents) continue to be reported.
As much as the “anti-illegal immigrant” movement claims it's not racist, you don't see attacks like these against Canadians or Europeans who are in this country without papers (yes, there are some). The US government is in league with this, unfortunately. Besides a rise in immigration raids, they continue working on a 700-mile border wall at a cost of billions of dollars, even though this may break about 35 environmental laws (who's the lawless now?).
Ruben Salazar deserves more attention and respect. We have a long way to go for equitable and just treatment of the poor, the dark skinned, the immigrant. Salazar was part of this struggle. We must continue to make this country truly free and truly fair. The “anti-illegal immigrant” movement is largely a throwback to Jim Crow and the Black Codes.
And remember: I'm on KJLH-FM, 102.3 "Front Page" talk show this week with Dominique Di Prima from 4:30 AM to 6 AM. Tune in if you can.
c/s
Returning to KJLH 102.3 FM-- with Dominique Di Prima
I'm back on KJLH 102.3 FM this week (April 21-25). It's always a pleasure. I'll be honorary co-host with Dominique Di Prima on the station's Front Page live talk show. Please listen in if you're in the LA area. It's early—4:30 AM to 6 AM. But the topics are timely and the callers lively.
Today on the air we had an old friend, Marie Deary from Shore Books & Art Gallery in Long Beach. She is also an expert on personal and business finances. Today she talked about credit reports, how they work and how to obtain a higher credit rating. This rating is how you can save money on interest rates when financing a home, car, or obtaining a loan. Marie says that in the long run keeping track of your credit report on an annual basis, and making sure you have a personal handle on what appears there, is how you can save money and get rid of a few headaches. She also has workshops on the topic on a regular basis. Go to www.shorebookslb.com to find out more.
We also talked by phone with Latricia Majors, mother of 16-year-old Pleajhai Mervin who a year ago reportedly had her wrist broken by a security guard at Pete Knight High School in Palmdale, CA. The security guard's actions were videtaped (apparently available on youtube.com). However, he has only been moved from his job. Pleajhai, on the hand, is facing criminal charges in juvenile court, although she's been a good student, never been in trouble with the law, and clearly the victim. Ms. Majors called on listeners to pray for her daughter so that she is not punished for doing nothing wrong. Justice can only happen when the community is galvanized, organized, and active.
Today Ms. Di Prima also asked me about LA City's Special Order 40, which prohibits police officers from asking immigrants if they have authorization to be in this country—unless (and this is what confuses people) they're suspected of committing a crime. SO40 was meant to stop the practice of doing the federal government's job. In local communities, many undocumented immigrants don't report crimes or become active in crime abatement due to fears of deportation. They thus become prey to criminals and gangs, which have robbed and attacked immigrants for years. SO40 allows immigrants to step up and help in real criminal offenses that if not addressed could hurt others.
I think it's a good law and should not be removed or amended (unless to make it fairer or stronger).
Again, police, if they have cause, can ask for these documents anytime. When someone is arrested and fails to show legal papers, police can report them. This is different than stopping people solely to turn them over to US immigration authorities.
The issue flared up recently when a suspected undocumented gang member was arrested for the shooting murder of 17-year-old African American Jamiel Stewart, Jr, a high school football player. This tragedy strikes at all our communities; it hurts us all, regardless of whether the shooter was undocumented or not. I understand many Latinos took part in Jamiel's memorial. This is still a tragedy that we must not forget.
However, should this now mean we need to rescind or amend Special Order 40? Not in my view. Laws already exist to report and eventually deport anyone convicted of crimes in the US. In fact, since 1996, when immigration law was changed to address undocumented criminals, some 700,000 people have been deported—most of them to Mexico, with significant numbers to Central America, Cambodia, Belize and other countries.
One problem is that a large number of these deportees were raised in the US, often only speaking English or very bad Spanish, and sent to countries without jobs, housing or educational options. Some of these had joined LA-based gangs, even learning sophisticated criminal activities in California's prisons. Now countries like El Salvador, Guatemala or Honduras have become violent gang-ridden countries. When you send 700,000 convicted people outside the country, you're bound to contribute major problems, including changing whole cultures.
Yes, the intensifying issues between African American and Latinos need to be dealt with seriously. But I implore all of us to remember history (when Blacks & Browns united), our common social/political/economic interests, and even what our adversaries are doing (they continue to contribute to and benefit from African Americans and Latinos going at each other's throats).
Yes I'm also aware there is much tension in the streets between Black and Brown gangs. But much of this is predicated on a race-based prison system that pervades our communities. Remember we have 175,000 state prisoners; they will most likely become a negative influence unless we provide adequate rehabilitation, training, and treatment to prisoners, as well as re-entry programs to re-integrate them into our communities. This is simply not happening, hurting all poor communities. I contend most of the race-based prison/street incidents are linked to the system's long-time “divide and conquer” strategies.
For example, Mexican prisoners in California are currently locked down after two Mexicans about a month ago allegedly stabbed four guards in Tehachapi State Prison (the prison system did this in case it was not a systemwide attack--similar incidents in other prisons involving Mexicans were also reported). But how are all Mexicans involved? In many prisons, if a white guy gets into a beef in a yard, all the whites in that yard are locked down; same with Blacks. The prison system was also known to set up "gladiator schools" where they pitted one race against another. Yes, many prisoners buy into this, and this is a shame. But it's rooted in the system's race-based policies.
Blacks are being attacked (mostly by racist whites, not Latinos), but so are undocumented immigrants (again mostly by white racists and Minutemen-type organizations). That's not to say that now white people should be targeted. They are not a monolith and many whites are willing to work with the rest of us for social and equitable changes for everyone. We should not lose sight of the institutional racism that forces both Black and Brown into the worse schools, worse housing, and worse jobs.
I don't condone anyone, Latinos included, who would attack or kill someone simply because of their race. In the face of this, we need to remember our intertwined destinies and not let anything like this tear us apart. For justice, we've gone too far to stop now. I hope this conversation continues throughout the week – I'm willing to hear all sides on this issue.
c/s
Read more
Today on the air we had an old friend, Marie Deary from Shore Books & Art Gallery in Long Beach. She is also an expert on personal and business finances. Today she talked about credit reports, how they work and how to obtain a higher credit rating. This rating is how you can save money on interest rates when financing a home, car, or obtaining a loan. Marie says that in the long run keeping track of your credit report on an annual basis, and making sure you have a personal handle on what appears there, is how you can save money and get rid of a few headaches. She also has workshops on the topic on a regular basis. Go to www.shorebookslb.com to find out more.
We also talked by phone with Latricia Majors, mother of 16-year-old Pleajhai Mervin who a year ago reportedly had her wrist broken by a security guard at Pete Knight High School in Palmdale, CA. The security guard's actions were videtaped (apparently available on youtube.com). However, he has only been moved from his job. Pleajhai, on the hand, is facing criminal charges in juvenile court, although she's been a good student, never been in trouble with the law, and clearly the victim. Ms. Majors called on listeners to pray for her daughter so that she is not punished for doing nothing wrong. Justice can only happen when the community is galvanized, organized, and active.
Today Ms. Di Prima also asked me about LA City's Special Order 40, which prohibits police officers from asking immigrants if they have authorization to be in this country—unless (and this is what confuses people) they're suspected of committing a crime. SO40 was meant to stop the practice of doing the federal government's job. In local communities, many undocumented immigrants don't report crimes or become active in crime abatement due to fears of deportation. They thus become prey to criminals and gangs, which have robbed and attacked immigrants for years. SO40 allows immigrants to step up and help in real criminal offenses that if not addressed could hurt others.
I think it's a good law and should not be removed or amended (unless to make it fairer or stronger).
Again, police, if they have cause, can ask for these documents anytime. When someone is arrested and fails to show legal papers, police can report them. This is different than stopping people solely to turn them over to US immigration authorities.
The issue flared up recently when a suspected undocumented gang member was arrested for the shooting murder of 17-year-old African American Jamiel Stewart, Jr, a high school football player. This tragedy strikes at all our communities; it hurts us all, regardless of whether the shooter was undocumented or not. I understand many Latinos took part in Jamiel's memorial. This is still a tragedy that we must not forget.
However, should this now mean we need to rescind or amend Special Order 40? Not in my view. Laws already exist to report and eventually deport anyone convicted of crimes in the US. In fact, since 1996, when immigration law was changed to address undocumented criminals, some 700,000 people have been deported—most of them to Mexico, with significant numbers to Central America, Cambodia, Belize and other countries.
One problem is that a large number of these deportees were raised in the US, often only speaking English or very bad Spanish, and sent to countries without jobs, housing or educational options. Some of these had joined LA-based gangs, even learning sophisticated criminal activities in California's prisons. Now countries like El Salvador, Guatemala or Honduras have become violent gang-ridden countries. When you send 700,000 convicted people outside the country, you're bound to contribute major problems, including changing whole cultures.
Yes, the intensifying issues between African American and Latinos need to be dealt with seriously. But I implore all of us to remember history (when Blacks & Browns united), our common social/political/economic interests, and even what our adversaries are doing (they continue to contribute to and benefit from African Americans and Latinos going at each other's throats).
Yes I'm also aware there is much tension in the streets between Black and Brown gangs. But much of this is predicated on a race-based prison system that pervades our communities. Remember we have 175,000 state prisoners; they will most likely become a negative influence unless we provide adequate rehabilitation, training, and treatment to prisoners, as well as re-entry programs to re-integrate them into our communities. This is simply not happening, hurting all poor communities. I contend most of the race-based prison/street incidents are linked to the system's long-time “divide and conquer” strategies.
For example, Mexican prisoners in California are currently locked down after two Mexicans about a month ago allegedly stabbed four guards in Tehachapi State Prison (the prison system did this in case it was not a systemwide attack--similar incidents in other prisons involving Mexicans were also reported). But how are all Mexicans involved? In many prisons, if a white guy gets into a beef in a yard, all the whites in that yard are locked down; same with Blacks. The prison system was also known to set up "gladiator schools" where they pitted one race against another. Yes, many prisoners buy into this, and this is a shame. But it's rooted in the system's race-based policies.
Blacks are being attacked (mostly by racist whites, not Latinos), but so are undocumented immigrants (again mostly by white racists and Minutemen-type organizations). That's not to say that now white people should be targeted. They are not a monolith and many whites are willing to work with the rest of us for social and equitable changes for everyone. We should not lose sight of the institutional racism that forces both Black and Brown into the worse schools, worse housing, and worse jobs.
I don't condone anyone, Latinos included, who would attack or kill someone simply because of their race. In the face of this, we need to remember our intertwined destinies and not let anything like this tear us apart. For justice, we've gone too far to stop now. I hope this conversation continues throughout the week – I'm willing to hear all sides on this issue.
c/s
Travel Updates from March
I travel about a third of the year speaking, reading and conducting workshops in cities all over the US as well as other countries. I love to travel—it would be a shame if I didn’t. Those who sponsor my events pay me honoraria so the rest of the year I can write; do volunteer community work, including Tia Chucha’s (neither my wife or I get paid for this); healing practices (linked to my sobriety and community work); and spend time with family, which, of course, is primary.
It’s a great life, although I’ve surmised my family’s glad I’m not always around.
In the past few weeks I’ve been to the San Francisco Bay Area, Northern California, Central Florida, Chicago and other Illinois cities, Ohio, and Michigan. Over the past two or three years, I’ve also been to Japan, Mexico, Guatemala, Venezuela (three times), and Peru (twice). I spoke in prisons, juvenile lockups, public schools, universities, conferences, poetry events, and more.
One important visit was to Orlando. In March I spoke at the University of Central Florida as well as Valencia Community College. A gang prevention/intervention conference at UCF included community activists, law enforcement, youth probation officers, school officials, and young people, a few in gangs. This conference addressed imaginative and redemptive strategies to deal with gangs rather than suppression and jails. Around the country people are considering new strategies and models since our jails, juvenile lockups and prisons are dangerously overcrowded (although gang & drug violence has not abated, and they’re now spread around the country).
In Valencia I dealt with a similar topic to a well-attended reading of my poetry, which often turn into town hall meetings. A large contingent of Central Americans came to my talk—they were in the US temporarily to study the gang phenomena here, which has now taken hold in countries like Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic (a couple of these people had heard me speak in Guatemala).
The most amazing aspect of my trip to Orlando, however, was visiting my 15-year-old grandson, Ricardo Rodriguez. The last time I saw him was when he was a year-and-a-half. I was excited and nervous; I understand he was too. We’ve stayed in communication over these years, mostly by email. We’ve also sent him birthday and Christmas presents. When I saw my grandson I could see the Raramuri (my mother’s indigenous ties from Mexico) and the Puerto Rican (from his mother’s side). He looked like his father, my son 32-year-old Ramiro (as most of you know, he’s currently incarcerated in the state of Illinois). Ramiro has never seen his son. Ricky, as we call him, also looked more like his uncles, my two youngest sons Ruben and Luis. Ricky is tall and handsome. He’s also smart, an A-student at a private Christian school.
With the help of his English teacher, I also got the opportunity to speak at Ricky’s school as well as a smaller writers’ group there. What an experience! Having my grandson in the audience during my talk was simply amazing. The students had tons of questions, especially about my former gang and drug life. But also how I overcame these—and about my work today helping youth and others re-imagine and recreate cohesive and imaginative communities.
At the writers’ group about a dozen students read their work, a few of which were written during the session. Others in the group offered encouragement and advice. I mostly listened, but a couple of times I offered my opinions. Ricky’s poem was short, but powerful and creative (he wrote it as we sat there).
Here’s an interesting fact: All four of my kids and four grandkids are great writers.
I had a wonderful time with Ricky and his family. Words can’t even describe.
After Florida, I flew into Chicago to take part in a Poetry Center reading at the School of the Art Institute downtown. Some 400 people showed up, mostly high school students, including a busload from Michigan. The reading went well and the questions were right on, especially from the youth.
From there I drove the next morning (I got up at 4:30 AM) to the Pontiac Prison facility to visit with Ramiro. We had five hours together and as always it was very respectful. My son and I have grown as father and son. It’s a shame this had to happen while he is behind bars. But there are fathers and sons who never breach their pains and distances. I’m honored I’ve been able to do this with Ramiro.
After this I drove further down to the middle of Illinois for a teacher’s reading conference in Springfield. I love talking to teachers—along with librarians they are some of my biggest supporters. They gave me a standing ovation and I met some great people in the schools who recognize the power of language and books for our communities.
After this I drove to Dekalb to stay with my Mexika Native friends, Frank and Lou Blazquez. They have a huge backyard where they built a sweat lodge, guided by their Lakota teacher, Ed Young-Man-Afraid-Of-His-Horses. It was good to see old friends, including the Blazquez kids, Tanee and Frankie (now young adults). They are also leaders in Youth Struggling for Survival. That night we did a Wachuma medicine all-night ceremony with Frank and three young YSS leaders. It was intense and deeply moving.
The next day after I had my time to rest and reflect, I drove another hour or so to Sterling, IL. I visited my 12-year-old granddaughter Amanda Mae Rodriguez. The next day I spoke at Sterling High School’s auditorium to Amanda and her fellow middle school students (their school is across the street). Again, it was so good to know that among the hundreds of students there, so was Amanda.
Amanda is also a fantastic student—the teachers had nothing but praise for her.
I also spoke to the Sterling HS student body—another amazing group of kids. And for two days I did two writing workshops with students and a few teachers in the library. One evening, I also spoke at the Latin American Social Club to about 200 people. Amanda stood next to me holding my books (I said she could sit down, but she wanted to stand there with me). I was so proud to have her there at my side.
Again, like with Ricky, it was sad to say goodby.
From Sterling, I drove back to Chicago—meeting with old friends. This included former Chicago gang member James Lilly, who’s now wheelchair bound from a gang-related shooting at 15. He’s also a world-class wheelchair racer and has an important film about his life and work called “Pushin’ Forward” – you can find out more at http://www.fanlight.com/catalog/films/463_pf.php.
From Chicago I came home for a short spell—back to family (which is always great), Tia Chucha’s, Young Warriors, the Community Engagement Advisory Committee of the LA City Ad Hoc Committee on Gang Violence & Youth Development, writing poems, essays, stories; and tons of regular mail and emails.
As they say, it’s all good.
c/s
Read more
It’s a great life, although I’ve surmised my family’s glad I’m not always around.
In the past few weeks I’ve been to the San Francisco Bay Area, Northern California, Central Florida, Chicago and other Illinois cities, Ohio, and Michigan. Over the past two or three years, I’ve also been to Japan, Mexico, Guatemala, Venezuela (three times), and Peru (twice). I spoke in prisons, juvenile lockups, public schools, universities, conferences, poetry events, and more.
One important visit was to Orlando. In March I spoke at the University of Central Florida as well as Valencia Community College. A gang prevention/intervention conference at UCF included community activists, law enforcement, youth probation officers, school officials, and young people, a few in gangs. This conference addressed imaginative and redemptive strategies to deal with gangs rather than suppression and jails. Around the country people are considering new strategies and models since our jails, juvenile lockups and prisons are dangerously overcrowded (although gang & drug violence has not abated, and they’re now spread around the country).
In Valencia I dealt with a similar topic to a well-attended reading of my poetry, which often turn into town hall meetings. A large contingent of Central Americans came to my talk—they were in the US temporarily to study the gang phenomena here, which has now taken hold in countries like Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic (a couple of these people had heard me speak in Guatemala).
The most amazing aspect of my trip to Orlando, however, was visiting my 15-year-old grandson, Ricardo Rodriguez. The last time I saw him was when he was a year-and-a-half. I was excited and nervous; I understand he was too. We’ve stayed in communication over these years, mostly by email. We’ve also sent him birthday and Christmas presents. When I saw my grandson I could see the Raramuri (my mother’s indigenous ties from Mexico) and the Puerto Rican (from his mother’s side). He looked like his father, my son 32-year-old Ramiro (as most of you know, he’s currently incarcerated in the state of Illinois). Ramiro has never seen his son. Ricky, as we call him, also looked more like his uncles, my two youngest sons Ruben and Luis. Ricky is tall and handsome. He’s also smart, an A-student at a private Christian school.
With the help of his English teacher, I also got the opportunity to speak at Ricky’s school as well as a smaller writers’ group there. What an experience! Having my grandson in the audience during my talk was simply amazing. The students had tons of questions, especially about my former gang and drug life. But also how I overcame these—and about my work today helping youth and others re-imagine and recreate cohesive and imaginative communities.
At the writers’ group about a dozen students read their work, a few of which were written during the session. Others in the group offered encouragement and advice. I mostly listened, but a couple of times I offered my opinions. Ricky’s poem was short, but powerful and creative (he wrote it as we sat there).
Here’s an interesting fact: All four of my kids and four grandkids are great writers.
I had a wonderful time with Ricky and his family. Words can’t even describe.
After Florida, I flew into Chicago to take part in a Poetry Center reading at the School of the Art Institute downtown. Some 400 people showed up, mostly high school students, including a busload from Michigan. The reading went well and the questions were right on, especially from the youth.
From there I drove the next morning (I got up at 4:30 AM) to the Pontiac Prison facility to visit with Ramiro. We had five hours together and as always it was very respectful. My son and I have grown as father and son. It’s a shame this had to happen while he is behind bars. But there are fathers and sons who never breach their pains and distances. I’m honored I’ve been able to do this with Ramiro.
After this I drove further down to the middle of Illinois for a teacher’s reading conference in Springfield. I love talking to teachers—along with librarians they are some of my biggest supporters. They gave me a standing ovation and I met some great people in the schools who recognize the power of language and books for our communities.
After this I drove to Dekalb to stay with my Mexika Native friends, Frank and Lou Blazquez. They have a huge backyard where they built a sweat lodge, guided by their Lakota teacher, Ed Young-Man-Afraid-Of-His-Horses. It was good to see old friends, including the Blazquez kids, Tanee and Frankie (now young adults). They are also leaders in Youth Struggling for Survival. That night we did a Wachuma medicine all-night ceremony with Frank and three young YSS leaders. It was intense and deeply moving.
The next day after I had my time to rest and reflect, I drove another hour or so to Sterling, IL. I visited my 12-year-old granddaughter Amanda Mae Rodriguez. The next day I spoke at Sterling High School’s auditorium to Amanda and her fellow middle school students (their school is across the street). Again, it was so good to know that among the hundreds of students there, so was Amanda.
Amanda is also a fantastic student—the teachers had nothing but praise for her.
I also spoke to the Sterling HS student body—another amazing group of kids. And for two days I did two writing workshops with students and a few teachers in the library. One evening, I also spoke at the Latin American Social Club to about 200 people. Amanda stood next to me holding my books (I said she could sit down, but she wanted to stand there with me). I was so proud to have her there at my side.
Again, like with Ricky, it was sad to say goodby.
From Sterling, I drove back to Chicago—meeting with old friends. This included former Chicago gang member James Lilly, who’s now wheelchair bound from a gang-related shooting at 15. He’s also a world-class wheelchair racer and has an important film about his life and work called “Pushin’ Forward” – you can find out more at http://www.fanlight.com/catalog/films/463_pf.php.
From Chicago I came home for a short spell—back to family (which is always great), Tia Chucha’s, Young Warriors, the Community Engagement Advisory Committee of the LA City Ad Hoc Committee on Gang Violence & Youth Development, writing poems, essays, stories; and tons of regular mail and emails.
As they say, it’s all good.
c/s
For Trini with Love
Twenty years ago I did one of the best things I've ever done in my life—I married Maria Trinidad Cardenas. She is my best friend, mother of my two youngest sons, spiritual companion, and fellow founder of Tia Chucha's (and fellow revolutionary for truly encompassing and imaginative social change in this country).
In twenty years we've grown tremendously, having gone through much struggle, pain, sacrifice, and losses. But we also achieved healing, knowledge, wisdom, and mature love. The two most wonderful contributions we made to this world was having and raising our boys: Ruben Joaquin, who turns 20 this year, and Luis Jacinto, who turns 14. I say with much bias and fact—they are the two best boys any parents can have.
I attribute this to the sober fathering I eventually learned to apply with these young men. But mostly it was because of Trini's mothering melded with the most amazing stability and tenderness. In truth this also took much struggle to grasp—Trini like many parents was insecure, fearful, capable of many mistakes (like me). But with an awakened awareness, learned sharing and caring, Trini and I prevailed.
Presently, Ruben is an accomplished musician (he was part of the Inner Spark summer program at Cal Arts in Valencia, CA two summers ago) and a full-time Mission Community College student. He graduated a year early from City of Angels High School, part of LA Unified School District's Independent Studies Options program (where I spoke at their graduation ceremony).
Luis is a mostly A-student at Valley Alternative School in the San Fernando Valley. He's also a wonderful artist and cartoonist. He is applying with a portfolio to a prestigious LA County arts high school. This is very competitive, and Luis is aware he may not be accepted. But he told Trini and I that he wanted to try. That's all we've ever asked of him—“always do your best, even if you don't get what you aim for.” In time, his dreams will come true.
When Trini and I married in Kenosha, Wisconsin those 20 years ago, we both harbored uncertainty about a future and many concerns about each other. We had both been hurt in love and life (I was married and divorced twice before with two other children; Trini had also been married and divorced before). I was 33 years old; Trini was 34 (I always joke how she robbed the cradle when she married me).
I was also drinking, which I had done along with drugs since I was 12 years old. But my life was making a major turn at the time of our marriage: My oldest son Ramiro (then 13) was coming from LA to live with Trini and I in Chicago (my daughter, Andrea, joined us a couple of years later). Trini was also three months pregnant with Ruben—the major catalyst (and our love, of course) for the marriage). By then I also had earnestly accelerated my poetry/writing life, taking part in the growing Chicago poetry scene that eventually led to my helping found the Guild Complex Literary & Arts Center, Tia Chucha Press, the Chicago Poetry Festival, Prism Writers Workshops, and more.
Our first years as married couple were extremely difficult—with a very resentful teenager, a new baby, my absences due to work (I worked two to three jobs, wrote when I could, and attended poetry events), and increased problems with my drinking. I won't go into all of this here, but in time I learned to sober up (I've been clean now for more than 15 years), be a better father to Ramiro and Andrea, and, in time, for Ruben.
In 1994, a year after my biggest book, Always Running, got published and a year after my recovery, we had Luis. I was already active in work with gang and nongang youth due to Ramiro's gang involvement. I helped start Youth Struggling for Survival, the Increase the Peace Network, and the Humboldt Park Teen Reach as a result.
However, one of the most devastating losses (we also lost a few young men & women I helped mentor in the Chicago gang wars during this time) was the imprisonment of Ramiro for 28 years in Illinois's Department of Corrections.
By 2000, Trini and I were ready to return to LA—Trini grew up in Pacoima; I grew up in South Central and the East LA areas. We made sure Ramiro understood and accepted our decision (he did). After selling our house in Logan Square, packing and sending our stuff off in a large tractor-trailer through a moving company, the family took a train with Ruben and Luis back to the old Pacoima neighborhood where Trini had grown up.
In 2001, we bought a house and moved to San Fernando, a couple of miles from Trini's childhood home. We also began work on creating a cafe, bookstore, performance space, and arts workshop center that became known as Tia Chucha's Cafe & Centro Cultural. Later Andrea and her daughter Catalina came to move in with us as well (for which I was most grateful).
The rest is history as they say.
But for now let me say—we've had a difficult time as partners, as husband-and-wife, as parents. But I've never known anyone who has withstood all this and grown like Trini. I'm awestruck by her fortitude and perseverance. She has taught me much about change, focus and love. Today we still work together at Tia Chucha's (it's now Tia Chucha's Bookstore & Cultural Center). We're still actively engaged in revolutionary education and organizing. And we are both healers and water pourers for the San Fernando Sweat Lodge after years of training and ceremonies in the Lakota, Navajo and Mexika traditions (also some ten years ago Trini was adopted by Navajo medicine man Anthony Lee and his wife Delores).
As Trini wrote to me today, “It's been a rocky and wonderful twenty years. I'm so glad we haven't given up on each other when the going got rough. Our boys and you are so worth all the question marks leading to now.”
Yes, questions marks. They are always around us. And I've come to realize, most of them get answered by what we do, what we say, and what we create in our journeys to find true love, parenthood, community, and even social justice. Tlazhokamati, Trini. Gracias, thanks.
I know I have much more life to live, but I've already achieved many, many of my dreams and hopes. And for this—for my dearest Trini—I'm eternally grateful.
c/s
Read more
In twenty years we've grown tremendously, having gone through much struggle, pain, sacrifice, and losses. But we also achieved healing, knowledge, wisdom, and mature love. The two most wonderful contributions we made to this world was having and raising our boys: Ruben Joaquin, who turns 20 this year, and Luis Jacinto, who turns 14. I say with much bias and fact—they are the two best boys any parents can have.
I attribute this to the sober fathering I eventually learned to apply with these young men. But mostly it was because of Trini's mothering melded with the most amazing stability and tenderness. In truth this also took much struggle to grasp—Trini like many parents was insecure, fearful, capable of many mistakes (like me). But with an awakened awareness, learned sharing and caring, Trini and I prevailed.
Presently, Ruben is an accomplished musician (he was part of the Inner Spark summer program at Cal Arts in Valencia, CA two summers ago) and a full-time Mission Community College student. He graduated a year early from City of Angels High School, part of LA Unified School District's Independent Studies Options program (where I spoke at their graduation ceremony).
Luis is a mostly A-student at Valley Alternative School in the San Fernando Valley. He's also a wonderful artist and cartoonist. He is applying with a portfolio to a prestigious LA County arts high school. This is very competitive, and Luis is aware he may not be accepted. But he told Trini and I that he wanted to try. That's all we've ever asked of him—“always do your best, even if you don't get what you aim for.” In time, his dreams will come true.
When Trini and I married in Kenosha, Wisconsin those 20 years ago, we both harbored uncertainty about a future and many concerns about each other. We had both been hurt in love and life (I was married and divorced twice before with two other children; Trini had also been married and divorced before). I was 33 years old; Trini was 34 (I always joke how she robbed the cradle when she married me).
I was also drinking, which I had done along with drugs since I was 12 years old. But my life was making a major turn at the time of our marriage: My oldest son Ramiro (then 13) was coming from LA to live with Trini and I in Chicago (my daughter, Andrea, joined us a couple of years later). Trini was also three months pregnant with Ruben—the major catalyst (and our love, of course) for the marriage). By then I also had earnestly accelerated my poetry/writing life, taking part in the growing Chicago poetry scene that eventually led to my helping found the Guild Complex Literary & Arts Center, Tia Chucha Press, the Chicago Poetry Festival, Prism Writers Workshops, and more.
Our first years as married couple were extremely difficult—with a very resentful teenager, a new baby, my absences due to work (I worked two to three jobs, wrote when I could, and attended poetry events), and increased problems with my drinking. I won't go into all of this here, but in time I learned to sober up (I've been clean now for more than 15 years), be a better father to Ramiro and Andrea, and, in time, for Ruben.
In 1994, a year after my biggest book, Always Running, got published and a year after my recovery, we had Luis. I was already active in work with gang and nongang youth due to Ramiro's gang involvement. I helped start Youth Struggling for Survival, the Increase the Peace Network, and the Humboldt Park Teen Reach as a result.
However, one of the most devastating losses (we also lost a few young men & women I helped mentor in the Chicago gang wars during this time) was the imprisonment of Ramiro for 28 years in Illinois's Department of Corrections.
By 2000, Trini and I were ready to return to LA—Trini grew up in Pacoima; I grew up in South Central and the East LA areas. We made sure Ramiro understood and accepted our decision (he did). After selling our house in Logan Square, packing and sending our stuff off in a large tractor-trailer through a moving company, the family took a train with Ruben and Luis back to the old Pacoima neighborhood where Trini had grown up.
In 2001, we bought a house and moved to San Fernando, a couple of miles from Trini's childhood home. We also began work on creating a cafe, bookstore, performance space, and arts workshop center that became known as Tia Chucha's Cafe & Centro Cultural. Later Andrea and her daughter Catalina came to move in with us as well (for which I was most grateful).
The rest is history as they say.
But for now let me say—we've had a difficult time as partners, as husband-and-wife, as parents. But I've never known anyone who has withstood all this and grown like Trini. I'm awestruck by her fortitude and perseverance. She has taught me much about change, focus and love. Today we still work together at Tia Chucha's (it's now Tia Chucha's Bookstore & Cultural Center). We're still actively engaged in revolutionary education and organizing. And we are both healers and water pourers for the San Fernando Sweat Lodge after years of training and ceremonies in the Lakota, Navajo and Mexika traditions (also some ten years ago Trini was adopted by Navajo medicine man Anthony Lee and his wife Delores).
As Trini wrote to me today, “It's been a rocky and wonderful twenty years. I'm so glad we haven't given up on each other when the going got rough. Our boys and you are so worth all the question marks leading to now.”
Yes, questions marks. They are always around us. And I've come to realize, most of them get answered by what we do, what we say, and what we create in our journeys to find true love, parenthood, community, and even social justice. Tlazhokamati, Trini. Gracias, thanks.
I know I have much more life to live, but I've already achieved many, many of my dreams and hopes. And for this—for my dearest Trini—I'm eternally grateful.
c/s
The Power of Youth, Their Voices & Community
The Koures Youth Symposium, held February 20-24, 2008, brought some 25 young people and 20 adults to Camp Newman in Santa Rosa, CA to create poetry, dance and song around Native American and African stories interpreted by mythologist and storyteller Michael Meade. Meade created the Mosaic Multicultural Foundation of Seattle, WA (which sponsored the symposium) some 20 years ago to address the growing issues of uncertainty and chaos in the world with the creative power of story, poetry, song, dance, rituals, and intense & meaningful dialogue. It’s how we bring together the broken pieces of community with authenticity and imagination.
The participants included homeless youth from Seattle; Black and Latino gang members from Los Angeles; white students from rural Wisconsin; Mexika (Aztec) singers & dancers, poets and activists from the Bay Area, and others. The staff included psychologists, an African drummer & dance teacher, poets, and Chi Gong practitioners. I served as teacher/poet with Michael Meade, who based this event on his own study of ancient stories and their connection to modern times. Meade has been doing these kinds of events around the country for several years under the aegis of “Voices of Youth, Voices of Community,” which I’ve been privileged to help as a poet in Boyle Heights/East LA and other communities.
Essentially, young people in various stages of trouble and transformation were helped in creating their own unique verse, in their own voices (with some assistance in shaping and editing their work) for four days in the woods. They also learned African dance from Duncan Allard, a practitioner in the Shona tribal traditions of Zimbabwe, various songs from indigenous Africa and Mexico, and aspects of stage presence.
A few of the young people were quite active in poetry, even performance and Hip Hop. But most had never written poems before. Most had never had to connect words with feelings, with ideas, with pain, with joy, with community. By the fifth day we had the whole group make a public presentation at the Brava Theater in the Mission district of San Francisco. Some 200 people showed up to hear original poems – all were truly amazing – Meade’s stories; Mexika, African & Brazilian songs; and an incredible warrior dance from Zimbabwe. I also read a poem and did what we call a “harangue” on the power of language shaping for healing as well as personal and social development.
It was a movingly powerful event that at one point had everyone in the audience on their feet.
This symposium started me on a new round of trips that will also have me in Florida, Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan by the end of March. The exhaustive work at Koures also turned out energizing, carrying me through a number of talks in schools, prisons, juvenile lock ups, universities, conferences, and other venues.
For one, I didn’t leave Northern California following the Brava Theater presentation. I ended up in the Sacramento area to do two workshops/talks at the New Folsom Prison (Maximum Security B and A yards). I was supposed to address a long-standing writers’ group out of C Yard, who knew about my work and were expecting my visit. But several stabbings in that yard over the previous two weeks had them locked down. I ended up in B Yard, another Max yard, which had no writers’ group. Still some 40 men showed up to hear me read poetry and talk. In the end the men requested to have their own writers’ group, which I hope does happen. I also talked to a smaller group of prisoners in A Yard before returning back to the Bay Area. As always in the talks/readings in prisons, we had a wonderful time dealing with some vital issues.
Through Intersections for the Arts and Writers Corps, I ended up in a juvenile lock up just south of San Francisco addressing several young men—another powerful time with young people that most of our society has written off. I also took part in an event at Intersection for the Arts in the Mission that included readings by youth in the Writers Corps program. The next day I was at the Mission Public Library where I read and spoke to a standing-room only group. Then the following day I went to the Alameda County Juvenile Hall (now totally renovated into an electronics prison-liked institution) and the San Francisco County Juvenile Guidance Center in a maximum unit. Again, I have to thank Amy Cheney of the Right to Read program and all the staff and teachers who arranged for this. The young people were respectful and attentive, and they were also sharp and incisive in their questions and remarks. They do not deserve to be written off, regardless of what they’ve done. Punishment as the essential form of “rehabilitation” in juvenile facilities and prisons has only made resentment and rage the main response from the youth and prisoners instead of redemption. Yes, we need consequences, but a major aspect of these should be helping these young men and women with their own healing, including linking to vital internal and external sources for change, passion, and positive contributions to community.
In spite of the inane punishment-driven institutions we send our most troubled men and women, as I said, there are heroic people in those institutions trying to make some important impact with little to work with. I’m honored they think of me from time to time to help in this work.
I'd like to end this with a poem from one of the Koures Youth Symposium participants, Rose Conley, who wrote this during the five days of our deliberations. It's called "A True Story About Poetry":
A homeless man in London sat on the ground and on the ground he spread a blanket and on the blanket he spread brightly colored envelopes. Walking by, I asked him what they were. “Poems,” he said in English. “How much?” I asked in American. He shrugged across the Atlantic and I trickled down a few pound coins on to his blanket, made my selection, and turned back towards the West End. As I walked, I read. The poem was called, “I Bring You Oranges.”
Eight years later, I found myself in a room full of strangers, spreading out my blanket. Looking around, everyone had their blanket spread out, and we browsed, dropping pound coins and making our selections. My blanket was the emptiest, and I didn’t have much to share, and the other people had piles of envelopes stacked like strata in front of them and they had brought their lives and their letters and their drumbeats and their heartbeats and their mouths and their necks. I didn’t have much, so I brought them oranges, and I fed them oranges while they fed me their poems.
Read more
The participants included homeless youth from Seattle; Black and Latino gang members from Los Angeles; white students from rural Wisconsin; Mexika (Aztec) singers & dancers, poets and activists from the Bay Area, and others. The staff included psychologists, an African drummer & dance teacher, poets, and Chi Gong practitioners. I served as teacher/poet with Michael Meade, who based this event on his own study of ancient stories and their connection to modern times. Meade has been doing these kinds of events around the country for several years under the aegis of “Voices of Youth, Voices of Community,” which I’ve been privileged to help as a poet in Boyle Heights/East LA and other communities.
Essentially, young people in various stages of trouble and transformation were helped in creating their own unique verse, in their own voices (with some assistance in shaping and editing their work) for four days in the woods. They also learned African dance from Duncan Allard, a practitioner in the Shona tribal traditions of Zimbabwe, various songs from indigenous Africa and Mexico, and aspects of stage presence.
A few of the young people were quite active in poetry, even performance and Hip Hop. But most had never written poems before. Most had never had to connect words with feelings, with ideas, with pain, with joy, with community. By the fifth day we had the whole group make a public presentation at the Brava Theater in the Mission district of San Francisco. Some 200 people showed up to hear original poems – all were truly amazing – Meade’s stories; Mexika, African & Brazilian songs; and an incredible warrior dance from Zimbabwe. I also read a poem and did what we call a “harangue” on the power of language shaping for healing as well as personal and social development.
It was a movingly powerful event that at one point had everyone in the audience on their feet.
This symposium started me on a new round of trips that will also have me in Florida, Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan by the end of March. The exhaustive work at Koures also turned out energizing, carrying me through a number of talks in schools, prisons, juvenile lock ups, universities, conferences, and other venues.
For one, I didn’t leave Northern California following the Brava Theater presentation. I ended up in the Sacramento area to do two workshops/talks at the New Folsom Prison (Maximum Security B and A yards). I was supposed to address a long-standing writers’ group out of C Yard, who knew about my work and were expecting my visit. But several stabbings in that yard over the previous two weeks had them locked down. I ended up in B Yard, another Max yard, which had no writers’ group. Still some 40 men showed up to hear me read poetry and talk. In the end the men requested to have their own writers’ group, which I hope does happen. I also talked to a smaller group of prisoners in A Yard before returning back to the Bay Area. As always in the talks/readings in prisons, we had a wonderful time dealing with some vital issues.
Through Intersections for the Arts and Writers Corps, I ended up in a juvenile lock up just south of San Francisco addressing several young men—another powerful time with young people that most of our society has written off. I also took part in an event at Intersection for the Arts in the Mission that included readings by youth in the Writers Corps program. The next day I was at the Mission Public Library where I read and spoke to a standing-room only group. Then the following day I went to the Alameda County Juvenile Hall (now totally renovated into an electronics prison-liked institution) and the San Francisco County Juvenile Guidance Center in a maximum unit. Again, I have to thank Amy Cheney of the Right to Read program and all the staff and teachers who arranged for this. The young people were respectful and attentive, and they were also sharp and incisive in their questions and remarks. They do not deserve to be written off, regardless of what they’ve done. Punishment as the essential form of “rehabilitation” in juvenile facilities and prisons has only made resentment and rage the main response from the youth and prisoners instead of redemption. Yes, we need consequences, but a major aspect of these should be helping these young men and women with their own healing, including linking to vital internal and external sources for change, passion, and positive contributions to community.
In spite of the inane punishment-driven institutions we send our most troubled men and women, as I said, there are heroic people in those institutions trying to make some important impact with little to work with. I’m honored they think of me from time to time to help in this work.
I'd like to end this with a poem from one of the Koures Youth Symposium participants, Rose Conley, who wrote this during the five days of our deliberations. It's called "A True Story About Poetry":
A homeless man in London sat on the ground and on the ground he spread a blanket and on the blanket he spread brightly colored envelopes. Walking by, I asked him what they were. “Poems,” he said in English. “How much?” I asked in American. He shrugged across the Atlantic and I trickled down a few pound coins on to his blanket, made my selection, and turned back towards the West End. As I walked, I read. The poem was called, “I Bring You Oranges.”
Eight years later, I found myself in a room full of strangers, spreading out my blanket. Looking around, everyone had their blanket spread out, and we browsed, dropping pound coins and making our selections. My blanket was the emptiest, and I didn’t have much to share, and the other people had piles of envelopes stacked like strata in front of them and they had brought their lives and their letters and their drumbeats and their heartbeats and their mouths and their necks. I didn’t have much, so I brought them oranges, and I fed them oranges while they fed me their poems.
Community-Based Gang Intervention Model
After almost a year of ongoing meetings, writing, researching, debating, and fine-tuning, the Community Engagement Advisory Committee (CEAC) -- made up of gang intervention specialists, peace advocates, community leaders, and researchers -- of LA City's Ad Hoc Committee on Gang Violence & Youth Development, finished its ground-breaking Community-based Gang Intervention Model.
On February 13, the Ad Hoc committee, headed by City Councilman Tony Cardenas, presented this model for approval of the 15-member LA City Council. In an historic vote, the council voted unanimously to approve this model. This is a major victory, however, more must be done to implement such a model across LA's vast poor and working class communities where most gangs are located.
Although gang violence has gone down tremendously since the heyday of the 1980s and 1990s (one fact I came across claims that around 10,000 young people were killed in the LA area by gangs from 1980-2000), LA is still known as the "Gang Capital of the World." Police say there are 700 gangs and 40,000 gang members in LA, not counting the larger LA County area with several hundred more gangs and thousands more gang youth.
It's a real problems deserving of real and serious attention. For example, communities in East LA and South Central LA (now called South LA) have murder rates among African Americans and Latinos as high or higher than the murder rates in South Africa or El Salvador (both these countries have the world's highest murder rates).
However, for several decades, police suppression of gangs has been the main response from the city. These include gang injunctions where whole neighborhoods are put "under arrest" (people have strict curfews and can't interract, even if they'r related, can't have cell phones, baseball bats, and such). They include "three strikes and you're out" where convicted felons can be given 25-to-life prison sentences even for non-violent crimes. They include tearing down of whole housing projects, such as East LA's Aliso Village, which at one time was the largest housing projects west of the Mississippi. They include trying 14 years old as adults, giving kids 50 years and longer sentences (one 14-year-old received a death sentence for an incident in which no one was hurt).
This has only served to squeeze poor communities of color, forcing whole families to move into surrounding areas as well as across the country -- and taking the LA gangs and lifestyle everywhere. Today the biggest gang problem in the US involves LA-based gang structures like Sur Trece, 18th Street, Crips, Bloods, and MS-13, among others.
And we've created the largest prison system in the world, with 175,000 prisoners in close to 35 prisons, in California (thirty years ago the state had 15,000 prisoners in around 15 prisons).
Also US immigration authorities have been targeting immigrant gang youth, particularly after the LA Rebellion of 1992, but also since 1996 when convicted undocumented immigrants could be automatically deported. Since 1996, some 700,000 convicted undocumented felons have been deported, most of them to Mexico and Central America. Today LA-based gangs have become active in Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras (and recruiting among the poor and war-traumatized youth of those countries), but also Cambodia and Armenia.
CEAC's solutions are to stop this squeezing of our communuities ("concidently" opening up large inner-city areas to high-end development and gentrification) and to provide real resources of jobs, education, skills training, tattoo removal, and re-entry programs for prisoners/juvenile offenders. We want to make gang intervention a well-funed alternative to suppression, with teams of trained gang intervention workers able to move quickly among the gang hot spots. We also have included another prong to provide adequate wrap-around services to youth who need it.
In addition, the CEAC included important aspects of arts & culture (for creative, imaginative and culturally-engaged lives), faith-based/spiritual components, and more to help establish whole and healthy communities that can nurture whole and healthy people, particulary among our youth.
We believe gang intervention must be community-based, driven and led by community, not the police or politicians. Of course, the police, schools, city officials, city departments, and such should be integral to any urban peace plan. We welcome all members of the community to take positive and active steps to curtail the violence that is destroying families and communities.
c/s
Read more
On February 13, the Ad Hoc committee, headed by City Councilman Tony Cardenas, presented this model for approval of the 15-member LA City Council. In an historic vote, the council voted unanimously to approve this model. This is a major victory, however, more must be done to implement such a model across LA's vast poor and working class communities where most gangs are located.
Although gang violence has gone down tremendously since the heyday of the 1980s and 1990s (one fact I came across claims that around 10,000 young people were killed in the LA area by gangs from 1980-2000), LA is still known as the "Gang Capital of the World." Police say there are 700 gangs and 40,000 gang members in LA, not counting the larger LA County area with several hundred more gangs and thousands more gang youth.
It's a real problems deserving of real and serious attention. For example, communities in East LA and South Central LA (now called South LA) have murder rates among African Americans and Latinos as high or higher than the murder rates in South Africa or El Salvador (both these countries have the world's highest murder rates).
However, for several decades, police suppression of gangs has been the main response from the city. These include gang injunctions where whole neighborhoods are put "under arrest" (people have strict curfews and can't interract, even if they'r related, can't have cell phones, baseball bats, and such). They include "three strikes and you're out" where convicted felons can be given 25-to-life prison sentences even for non-violent crimes. They include tearing down of whole housing projects, such as East LA's Aliso Village, which at one time was the largest housing projects west of the Mississippi. They include trying 14 years old as adults, giving kids 50 years and longer sentences (one 14-year-old received a death sentence for an incident in which no one was hurt).
This has only served to squeeze poor communities of color, forcing whole families to move into surrounding areas as well as across the country -- and taking the LA gangs and lifestyle everywhere. Today the biggest gang problem in the US involves LA-based gang structures like Sur Trece, 18th Street, Crips, Bloods, and MS-13, among others.
And we've created the largest prison system in the world, with 175,000 prisoners in close to 35 prisons, in California (thirty years ago the state had 15,000 prisoners in around 15 prisons).
Also US immigration authorities have been targeting immigrant gang youth, particularly after the LA Rebellion of 1992, but also since 1996 when convicted undocumented immigrants could be automatically deported. Since 1996, some 700,000 convicted undocumented felons have been deported, most of them to Mexico and Central America. Today LA-based gangs have become active in Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras (and recruiting among the poor and war-traumatized youth of those countries), but also Cambodia and Armenia.
CEAC's solutions are to stop this squeezing of our communuities ("concidently" opening up large inner-city areas to high-end development and gentrification) and to provide real resources of jobs, education, skills training, tattoo removal, and re-entry programs for prisoners/juvenile offenders. We want to make gang intervention a well-funed alternative to suppression, with teams of trained gang intervention workers able to move quickly among the gang hot spots. We also have included another prong to provide adequate wrap-around services to youth who need it.
In addition, the CEAC included important aspects of arts & culture (for creative, imaginative and culturally-engaged lives), faith-based/spiritual components, and more to help establish whole and healthy communities that can nurture whole and healthy people, particulary among our youth.
We believe gang intervention must be community-based, driven and led by community, not the police or politicians. Of course, the police, schools, city officials, city departments, and such should be integral to any urban peace plan. We welcome all members of the community to take positive and active steps to curtail the violence that is destroying families and communities.
c/s
Another Friend Passes Over -- RIP raulrsalinas
Raul R. Salinas--also written as raulrsalinas--was an immense inspiration and mentor in my life and writing. Not only was he one of the veterans of Chicano poetry, he was known among the Beats, Jazz poets, and as a leading poet of the prison life after spending 11 years in state and federal prisons in California, Texas, Illinois, and Kentucky. He died today at age 73.
I knew Raul for many years. We took part in Native sweat ceremonies with Barrios Unidos in California; we read poetry together in various events, including in San Anto, Tejaztlan. He also founded La Resistencia Bookstore in Austin, serving as an example to me when I later helped create Tia Chucha's Centro Cultural & Bookstore in the San Fernando Valley section of LA.
One time we found ourselves in hotel rooms next to each other. I walked out into the balcony and saw Raul on his balcony looking into the Texas sky as I was doing. We shared moments about heroin addictions, jails, poetry, but also the Native spirituality we both shared. A couple of times he told me that his favorite poem of mine was "Tombstone Poets," about two heroin-addict poets in East LA.
My favorite of his was his most famous: "Un Trip Through the Mind Jail," a classic of Chicano poetry (actually of any poetry, anywhere). This text appeared in the 1960s and opened up the imaginations and language adventures of vatos like me.
Please go to his website at www.raulrsalinas.com to find out more about his work, his importance in US and world letters, and about La Resistencia.
A true revolutionary, poet of the people, human rights advocate, Native spiritual leader, and a great friend, I will miss Raul very much. I will also honor his life and work by continuing his struggles for the dignity and rights of all people, but in particular the Native peoples of this land, this country, this continent -- this world.
Tlazhokamati y tiahui.
c/s
Read more
I knew Raul for many years. We took part in Native sweat ceremonies with Barrios Unidos in California; we read poetry together in various events, including in San Anto, Tejaztlan. He also founded La Resistencia Bookstore in Austin, serving as an example to me when I later helped create Tia Chucha's Centro Cultural & Bookstore in the San Fernando Valley section of LA.
One time we found ourselves in hotel rooms next to each other. I walked out into the balcony and saw Raul on his balcony looking into the Texas sky as I was doing. We shared moments about heroin addictions, jails, poetry, but also the Native spirituality we both shared. A couple of times he told me that his favorite poem of mine was "Tombstone Poets," about two heroin-addict poets in East LA.
My favorite of his was his most famous: "Un Trip Through the Mind Jail," a classic of Chicano poetry (actually of any poetry, anywhere). This text appeared in the 1960s and opened up the imaginations and language adventures of vatos like me.
Please go to his website at www.raulrsalinas.com to find out more about his work, his importance in US and world letters, and about La Resistencia.
A true revolutionary, poet of the people, human rights advocate, Native spiritual leader, and a great friend, I will miss Raul very much. I will also honor his life and work by continuing his struggles for the dignity and rights of all people, but in particular the Native peoples of this land, this country, this continent -- this world.
Tlazhokamati y tiahui.
c/s
On the Road Again...
I'm getting ready to embark on a number of trips outside of town. I'll be in New Jersey this coming Monday, February 11. I return after a few days, and then I go to San Francisco for two weeks – to be part of the Mosaic Foundation's Koures Youth Symposium in Santa Rosa, CA (Tia Chucha's Young Warriors is bringing to young leaders as well), which culminates in a public event at the Brava Theater in the Mission district of San Francisco on February 24. I will also take part in programs sponsored by Intersection for the Arts and the Mission Public Library. In addition, I'll be visiting New Folsom prison near Sacramento, a youth detention facility in the Bay Area, and the juvenile halls of San Francisco and Alameda counties. You can get more information on my events page of my website: LuisJRodriguez.com
Then in March I will be visiting universities, high schools, poetry centers, elementary schools, and more in Florida, Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan. I'll be gone through the end of the month. In addition, I have some local schools – primarily those coming to Tia Chucha's for field trips (we have about two a month during the spring).
Traveling about a third of the year, I'm able to sustain my family and to help with Tia Chucha's – it also allows my wife Trini to devote more than 40 hours a week to Tia Chucha's without pay, but also for me to write, accomplish my commitments to Tia Chucha's, other community work, and, most importantly, to spend time with my family.
Recently, I spoke at the New Roads School in Santa Monica, invited by a good friend in a seminal rock & roll bad of the 1960s (I'll keep his name private for now), whose son goes to this school. With a roomful of students, we had a great discussion about gangs, drugs, how to overcome obstacles, the arts, and life in general. I also went to a Creative Writing class of another friend, Mel Donalson, at Cal State University, Los Angeles, where I got to speak about writing in different genres, the fiction dynamic, and my own writing process.
I also had an amazing time at Wilson High School in El Sereno/East LA where I spoke to several assemblies of students. On the walls in the auditorium, the students had placed posters and artwork with scenes from my book “Always Running.” Several young people even got up to read poetry and essays -- and there was two girls who announced that they stopped doing drugs after reading my book. I was very moved.
For Martin Luther King's Jr. birthday commemoration, I co-hosted with Elaine Swann a concert at Golden Hall in San Diego, CA with the incomparable Odetta, and various local singers, dancers, poets, and speakers. Some 600 people came.
I also did three events at the Getty Museum at the Getty Center around the fantastic photo exhibit by one of Mexico's leading photographers, Graciela Iturbide (the exhibit ends April 13, 2008). Her work captures the images of mostly indigenous people of Mexico, including the Tehuanas of Juchitan, Oaxaca (Zapoteca indigenous people), a place close to my heart when in the early 1980s I took part in uprisings against the Mexican government including when farmers, workers, students, and indigenous communities took over the city hall and demanded equal representation. It was quite a time – they were quite a people.
Graciela spent many years among them and these photos are internationally acclaimed. She also spent a couple of days in East LA and was one of the few Mexican photographers to capture the Cholo cultural phenomena of Chicanos in the 1980s – mostly women, many of whom were born deaf after a particularly powerful epidemic hit East LA's Mexican community in the 1960s.
I ended up speaking to a group of college and university professors as well as teachers at the Getty earlier in January. Then at the end of that month, I spoke to a group of students, black and brown, from Locke High School in Watts (the school was actually built on top of where my oldest sister once lived, and where I stayed a couple of summers when I was a kid).
This exhibit also allowed the Getty Museum to organize a panel of Chicano artists and writers to discuss art, Chicano life, and the Cholo culture, among other things, in the context of Iturbide's work. Visual artists Ernesto de la Loza and Alma Lopez as well as novelist Yxta Maya Murray were on the panel that I moderated to a fairly packed house on January 27. Powerful ideas, visions, and even critiques (in particular about museums, the Getty included) were on the table. However, we also affirmed our Chicano realities and the diverse means these are expressed in Chicano art, especially over the past 40 years. It turned out to be a rich and powerful discussion, including with the audience. I thank the Getty for inviting us to have this exchange.
Finally, I want to draw everyone's attention to an important upcoming event with the theme of “Common Roots, Common Dreams: A Celebration of the Commonality of Black and Mexican Culture & History.” With all the recent media attention on Black & Brown conflicts, this is in honor of what actually unites us and the reality that African Americans and Mexicans are more united than divided. Sponsored by Rock A Mole Festivals, CDs & Films, the event will be held Sunday, February 17 from 6 to 10 PM at Industry Cafe & Jazz, 6039 Washington Blvd. in the heart of the Arts District of Culver City. Food, beer and wine will be available.
This is a free event – Rock A Mole (rhymes with guacamole) festivals generally are. I'll be one of the hosts, and will do a poetry collaboration with one of LA's best performance poets, BessKepp. Also on hand will be new music with “Ten East” jazz band and a traditional Mexican band, “La Santa Cecilia;” a short play, “The First Embrace” that will depict Mexico's embrace of fugitive slaves despite enormous pressure from the US during the mid-1800s; a beat box chorus with both break dancers and traditional Mexican dancers; the world premiere of a new poem by Mike the Poet celebrating the ongoing synergy between Black and Mexican culture; and a killer house band with Fre Ballesteros (my favorite saxophone player in LA) of the Boxing Gandhis on sax, Michael Suicer of the Ray Charles Orchestra on drums, Boudro of the Gladys Knight band on bass, and G Mack of Polyester Players (who's played with the likes of Mary J. Blige) on guitar (singing will be one of my favorite singers in the city, and the creator of the music for my CD “My Name's Not Rodriguez,” Ernie Perez – musical director is Carvell Holloway, who also did the great trumpet solos on my CD).
To top it off some of the best African American and Mexican/Chicano poets and rappers will be performing, including TamaraBlue, Metaphysics, Sarah Cruse, Busstop Prophet, Ant Black, and Redemption (Redencion of Guanajuato, Mexico), among others. For more information, go to [email protected].
Don't miss this!
Read more
Then in March I will be visiting universities, high schools, poetry centers, elementary schools, and more in Florida, Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan. I'll be gone through the end of the month. In addition, I have some local schools – primarily those coming to Tia Chucha's for field trips (we have about two a month during the spring).
Traveling about a third of the year, I'm able to sustain my family and to help with Tia Chucha's – it also allows my wife Trini to devote more than 40 hours a week to Tia Chucha's without pay, but also for me to write, accomplish my commitments to Tia Chucha's, other community work, and, most importantly, to spend time with my family.
Recently, I spoke at the New Roads School in Santa Monica, invited by a good friend in a seminal rock & roll bad of the 1960s (I'll keep his name private for now), whose son goes to this school. With a roomful of students, we had a great discussion about gangs, drugs, how to overcome obstacles, the arts, and life in general. I also went to a Creative Writing class of another friend, Mel Donalson, at Cal State University, Los Angeles, where I got to speak about writing in different genres, the fiction dynamic, and my own writing process.
I also had an amazing time at Wilson High School in El Sereno/East LA where I spoke to several assemblies of students. On the walls in the auditorium, the students had placed posters and artwork with scenes from my book “Always Running.” Several young people even got up to read poetry and essays -- and there was two girls who announced that they stopped doing drugs after reading my book. I was very moved.
For Martin Luther King's Jr. birthday commemoration, I co-hosted with Elaine Swann a concert at Golden Hall in San Diego, CA with the incomparable Odetta, and various local singers, dancers, poets, and speakers. Some 600 people came.
I also did three events at the Getty Museum at the Getty Center around the fantastic photo exhibit by one of Mexico's leading photographers, Graciela Iturbide (the exhibit ends April 13, 2008). Her work captures the images of mostly indigenous people of Mexico, including the Tehuanas of Juchitan, Oaxaca (Zapoteca indigenous people), a place close to my heart when in the early 1980s I took part in uprisings against the Mexican government including when farmers, workers, students, and indigenous communities took over the city hall and demanded equal representation. It was quite a time – they were quite a people.
Graciela spent many years among them and these photos are internationally acclaimed. She also spent a couple of days in East LA and was one of the few Mexican photographers to capture the Cholo cultural phenomena of Chicanos in the 1980s – mostly women, many of whom were born deaf after a particularly powerful epidemic hit East LA's Mexican community in the 1960s.
I ended up speaking to a group of college and university professors as well as teachers at the Getty earlier in January. Then at the end of that month, I spoke to a group of students, black and brown, from Locke High School in Watts (the school was actually built on top of where my oldest sister once lived, and where I stayed a couple of summers when I was a kid).
This exhibit also allowed the Getty Museum to organize a panel of Chicano artists and writers to discuss art, Chicano life, and the Cholo culture, among other things, in the context of Iturbide's work. Visual artists Ernesto de la Loza and Alma Lopez as well as novelist Yxta Maya Murray were on the panel that I moderated to a fairly packed house on January 27. Powerful ideas, visions, and even critiques (in particular about museums, the Getty included) were on the table. However, we also affirmed our Chicano realities and the diverse means these are expressed in Chicano art, especially over the past 40 years. It turned out to be a rich and powerful discussion, including with the audience. I thank the Getty for inviting us to have this exchange.
Finally, I want to draw everyone's attention to an important upcoming event with the theme of “Common Roots, Common Dreams: A Celebration of the Commonality of Black and Mexican Culture & History.” With all the recent media attention on Black & Brown conflicts, this is in honor of what actually unites us and the reality that African Americans and Mexicans are more united than divided. Sponsored by Rock A Mole Festivals, CDs & Films, the event will be held Sunday, February 17 from 6 to 10 PM at Industry Cafe & Jazz, 6039 Washington Blvd. in the heart of the Arts District of Culver City. Food, beer and wine will be available.
This is a free event – Rock A Mole (rhymes with guacamole) festivals generally are. I'll be one of the hosts, and will do a poetry collaboration with one of LA's best performance poets, BessKepp. Also on hand will be new music with “Ten East” jazz band and a traditional Mexican band, “La Santa Cecilia;” a short play, “The First Embrace” that will depict Mexico's embrace of fugitive slaves despite enormous pressure from the US during the mid-1800s; a beat box chorus with both break dancers and traditional Mexican dancers; the world premiere of a new poem by Mike the Poet celebrating the ongoing synergy between Black and Mexican culture; and a killer house band with Fre Ballesteros (my favorite saxophone player in LA) of the Boxing Gandhis on sax, Michael Suicer of the Ray Charles Orchestra on drums, Boudro of the Gladys Knight band on bass, and G Mack of Polyester Players (who's played with the likes of Mary J. Blige) on guitar (singing will be one of my favorite singers in the city, and the creator of the music for my CD “My Name's Not Rodriguez,” Ernie Perez – musical director is Carvell Holloway, who also did the great trumpet solos on my CD).
To top it off some of the best African American and Mexican/Chicano poets and rappers will be performing, including TamaraBlue, Metaphysics, Sarah Cruse, Busstop Prophet, Ant Black, and Redemption (Redencion of Guanajuato, Mexico), among others. For more information, go to [email protected].
Don't miss this!
Hand Made Art Books of My Poetry
I've been honored to have four limited edition and signed hand-made artist books -- as well several broadsides -- of my poems published with a lot of love from the Pajaro, California-based C&C Press. The artists, Sher Zabaszkiewicz and Matt Cohen, created C&C Press to recapture the beauty, subtlety, grace, and craftmanship that hand-made artist books have embodied over the ages.
As the artists in the C&C Press' website say, "We began to realize that the artist's book operates best when a synergy is struck amongst its parts, creating a harmonious interrelationship between text, image, structure and design. That realization has forever change the way that we look at art and the artist's book."
Since 2005, Sher and Matt have published amazing collector's artist books of my work, numbered and signed, including "Seven," "Two Women/Dos Mujeres," "Making Medicine," and several broadsides of poetry and sayings. They operate out of a 2,100 square foot building housing a family business owned by Matt's parents. The space, some 30 minutes south of Santa Cruz, CA, includes a platemaking machine, foundry and wood type, various shears, drying racks, and more.
Sher and Matt have used materials like old T-shirts of mine to create the paper--which is also hand made--for these projects. They have travelled across the country to various university libraries, book fairs, and other institutions selling these amazing artists books at collector's prices.
In 2005, we had the first exhibit and presentation of their work at Tia Chucha's Centro Cultural & Bookstore. We hope to have another event featuring the latest artist's book of mine, "Making Medicine." In the future I will present them with more unpublished poems to complement their unique and powerful masterpieces.
To find out more about what Sher and Matt do, please go to their website at www.candcpress.com. They are working with other writers and artists on various projects as well. Please consider ordering these amazing books for your collections.
Read more
As the artists in the C&C Press' website say, "We began to realize that the artist's book operates best when a synergy is struck amongst its parts, creating a harmonious interrelationship between text, image, structure and design. That realization has forever change the way that we look at art and the artist's book."
Since 2005, Sher and Matt have published amazing collector's artist books of my work, numbered and signed, including "Seven," "Two Women/Dos Mujeres," "Making Medicine," and several broadsides of poetry and sayings. They operate out of a 2,100 square foot building housing a family business owned by Matt's parents. The space, some 30 minutes south of Santa Cruz, CA, includes a platemaking machine, foundry and wood type, various shears, drying racks, and more.
Sher and Matt have used materials like old T-shirts of mine to create the paper--which is also hand made--for these projects. They have travelled across the country to various university libraries, book fairs, and other institutions selling these amazing artists books at collector's prices.
In 2005, we had the first exhibit and presentation of their work at Tia Chucha's Centro Cultural & Bookstore. We hope to have another event featuring the latest artist's book of mine, "Making Medicine." In the future I will present them with more unpublished poems to complement their unique and powerful masterpieces.
To find out more about what Sher and Matt do, please go to their website at www.candcpress.com. They are working with other writers and artists on various projects as well. Please consider ordering these amazing books for your collections.
"Witnessing Whiteness" -- A New Book by Shelly Tochluk
My friend, Shelly Tochluk, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of the Elementary Education Department at Mount St. Mary's College near downtown LA where she trains teachers in the LA area. She has been active for years bringing consciousness of racism and race issues to various communities. She now has a book that attempts to address "whiteness" in the US with testimony by various cross-cultural leaders, activists and artists, male and female.
She's also on the leadership team of AWARE-LA -- Alliance of White Antiracists Everywhere-Los Angeles.
Shelly's book is "Witnessing Whiteness: First Steps Toward an Antiracist Practice and Culture," published by Rowman & Littlefield. Here's what Shelly has to say about this important book:
"Witnessing Whiteness" invites people, especially those of European ancestry, to consider their relationship to white privilege and the lingering shadows of racism. In an easy to read style, this book helps people understand why race is still a relevant issue, how race influences white people’s daily lives, and how to develop the beginnings of an antiracist practice.
This book includes personal testimony from well-respected cultural workers across race, such as Luis Rodriguez (author of Always Running), to offer dialogue that illustrates how whiteness embeds itself in our psyche, lingers through continued social conditioning, and affects cross-race interactions. This book is accessible and intended for all people, but speaks directly to educators and trainers at various levels.
For more information, visit the book website: www.witnessingwhiteness.com
Shelly's book release celebration is scheduled for February 23, 2008 from 5 to 9 PM. The evening will include poetry, dialogue, and exploration of the steps toward an antiracist practice and culture. It will be held at The Donahue Center, Mount St. Mary's College, 10 Chester Place, Los Angeles, CA 90007.
On March 2, 2008, Tia Chucha's Centro Cultural & Bookstore will be hosting a book reading and talk for "Witnessing Whiteness." Call 818-898-1479 for more information.
Read more
She's also on the leadership team of AWARE-LA -- Alliance of White Antiracists Everywhere-Los Angeles.
Shelly's book is "Witnessing Whiteness: First Steps Toward an Antiracist Practice and Culture," published by Rowman & Littlefield. Here's what Shelly has to say about this important book:
"Witnessing Whiteness" invites people, especially those of European ancestry, to consider their relationship to white privilege and the lingering shadows of racism. In an easy to read style, this book helps people understand why race is still a relevant issue, how race influences white people’s daily lives, and how to develop the beginnings of an antiracist practice.
This book includes personal testimony from well-respected cultural workers across race, such as Luis Rodriguez (author of Always Running), to offer dialogue that illustrates how whiteness embeds itself in our psyche, lingers through continued social conditioning, and affects cross-race interactions. This book is accessible and intended for all people, but speaks directly to educators and trainers at various levels.
For more information, visit the book website: www.witnessingwhiteness.com
Shelly's book release celebration is scheduled for February 23, 2008 from 5 to 9 PM. The evening will include poetry, dialogue, and exploration of the steps toward an antiracist practice and culture. It will be held at The Donahue Center, Mount St. Mary's College, 10 Chester Place, Los Angeles, CA 90007.
On March 2, 2008, Tia Chucha's Centro Cultural & Bookstore will be hosting a book reading and talk for "Witnessing Whiteness." Call 818-898-1479 for more information.
