It's Violent American Culture, Not Just Political Violence

The Gnadenhutten Massacre, 1782. (Credit: Archive Photos/Getty Images)

 

"The dominant media narrative is pushing the tired, hollow chorus, 'there's no place for political violence in America' as if centuries of racism, lynchings, assassinations, coups, and insurrections aren’t already the bedrock of American politics." -Dr. Stacey Patton

     In response to the recent Georgia and Colorado school shootings, the Charlotte subway stabbing, and the Utah Valley University shooting I wrote on Facebook:

"America was founded with violent warfare. America’s foundational economy was built and maintained through a system of inherent violence and tyranny. America’s identity and historical timeline is written and marked by warfare and centers violence: The American Revolution, the Civil War, WWI, WW2, Korean War, Vietnam War, etc. The patriotism many Americans embrace originates in the violence of "Patriots.” The American Flag is rooted in warfare and is a unifying military symbol beginning with the Revolutionary War. July 4th is a celebration of violent military conquest and fireworks symbolize cannons and gunfire. America is 249 years old and all 249 years it has either been in conflict with a foreign nation or in conflict with its own citizens. America has never experienced a year of peace. America has even been in constant conflict with the land, water, air and other life forms with pollution and ecocide. America prides itself on warfare and military might; its Defense Budget is nearly $1 trillion dollars. No nation owns more guns than America. No nation has more people incarcerated than America. No nation has experienced more school shootings than America. America has always been violent and millions of people have died on this land, many for simply existing and desiring peace.

What you have been watching is a society born and baptized in violence. America’s psychopathic culture of violence needs to change. How America writes its historical timeline in blood, and marks its most significant events with blood, has to change. If this does not change, children are going to continue being born immunized against peace."

     Whether you agree or not, violence is a core part of America's DNA. It is impossible to separate violence and imperialism from what it means to be an American and simultaneously embrace American history and culture. In fact, there is no nation that is considered more historically violent than America and U.S. History is proudly taught from the point of view of 'centering' violence and warfare. This means that there is a primary focus on violence and warfare as the main subjects of American history while excluding other factors as less important. Children in school are not primarily learning that America's most significant events are moments centered in love, peace, and happiness. They are learning about struggle, conflict and turmoil from Colonial Era warfare to the War in Afghanistan. 

U.S. History Classroom Poster of highlighting major American events

Some would argue that all nations were born through violent conflict, which is untrue. People seem to confuse a nation with a country or a state. A nation is a group of people who have a shared identity, history and culture which is often indigenous to a specific territory, regardless of so-called country or state-imposed borders. A country or state is a geopolitical entity with defined borders and a government that was oftentimes established through some form of conflict and ecocide. In other words, a country or state only exists by engaging a nation of people and superimposing defined borders and a government on the lands that this nation inhabits. That engagement, as in some African/Indigenous nations, could have happened through peaceful unification of shared values among groups. Imperialistic engagement has always been marked by violent warfare and ecocide against nations. There are nations of people who were founded in peace, who lived in peace, until that peace was disrupted by White American ancestors welding a Doctrine of Discovery; the legal and religious "right" that justified Christian explorers and colonists to take the land and murder Indigenous peoples. While you can find some nations, countries, and states founded in peace and living in peace, America is not that country, nor has it ever been. And because America is not, and some Americans have accepted its violent history as normal, that does not make it normal for the rest of the world. America's violent history that it celebrates and pridefully teaches to American children is not normal. 

     2026 will mark the 250th Anniversary of America's violent founding. People around the country will be bombarded with patriotism and reminded of its violent wars and struggles of genocidal enslavers to be independent. Children in elementary school will read books about colonizers who murdered indigenous people, and complete coloring sheets honoring men who enslaved African people. The Social Studies curriculum that middle schoolers and high schoolers will learn will be U.S. History, Geography, Civics, Government, Economics, and even World History centered in violence. There is no way that these students can accurately learn about capitalism without conflict, government without turmoil, and America's timeline without war. As adults, we will be pressured into being patriotic; proud American citizens who are grateful for the bloodshed of millions for us to enjoy the privilege to not even think about, talk about, or care about it. 

The KKK marches down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C. in 1926

     Some may read this and accuse me of being Anti-American. No, there are many things that I enjoy about this country, yet I am also anti-devilishment, which means I am against evil and wrongdoing, regardless who is doing. With the recent deaths that we have seen, people appear to cherry pick which lives are worthy of celebrating and which lives are not. Many of us have normalized American violence to the point where we are selective about whose death saddens us. We selectively care, using a sliding scale of empathy regarding others humanity. Violence to them is rationalized by race, religion, politics, gender, age, and/or socioeconomic status. This is how KKK members were rationalized as a protected class of American Patriots and a film about their imagined heroism was screened at the White House, while they domestically terrorized Black people. For some people, the talking point “there is no place for political violence” does not mean that they categorically condemn political violence. What they really mean is “there are 'other places' for political violence, for other people.” People will express being sad and heartbroken about the death of a conservative influencer yet be silent about children dying in a school shooting, Black people being murdered in a grocery store or church, or women dying from sexual violence. They will tweet and post about no political violence when it comes to certain people... and places... in America... but completely ignore the political violence against other Americans and America's political violence on foreign lands. Some people have normalized American violence to the point where they cannot even imagine a world of peace and consider nothing more than an unattainable, unrealistic, utopian dream. The violence that we see is homegrown and as American as apple pie. They are not senseless or without reason. The reason is America has created a psychopathic culture of violence where these acts have occurred within the context of American history, upon an American sociopolitical landscape, and within an American framework of violence and warfare. It's where we live, what we celebrate, and what we do, as Americans. If we want to see different, we have to teach and show children that love, peace and happiness is of the highest value. We have to redefine what it means to be American and rewrite/retell its history to reflect that identity without negating the conflicts, turmoil, and struggles. Its conflicts, turmoil and struggles need to be decentered and not the highlight reel of who we are. That is, if that is not who we are or what we desire to be as a country. The problem is that is the source of pride for many Americans and exactly who they want to be. It's in their blood, like the red on their flags that they mount to their vehicles and fly in front of their homes. 

     I typically greet people and depart with the word "PEACE." It is a fundamental part of my language and culture to begin things in peace and to end them in peace. Whatever happens in-between exists within that fundamental framework of "PEACE." Yes, I get upset, yes things may not go right, and yes, I experience conflict and turmoil at times yet at the end of the day my orientation is peace. America's orientation is and has always been violence and war, since its 1776 inception to modern day. Whatever good history that has happened in-between exists within that fundamental framework of violence and war. If this does not change, we will continue to see the same violence.

Peace,

Saladin

13 Ways To Survive Living In Chicago

   
   In my STYA After School Program recently some of my students were putting me on to some of their favorite Rappers, most who came from Chicago. I began to recognize a pattern beyond the Drill style rap music and gritty lyrics; many of these young rappers were no longer here. Song after song my students would share with me the gruesome tale behind these young men getting murdered. Since 2014 there's been dozens of young Chicago rappers, many of them teenagers, whose blood was spilled in the streets. 

   In 2016 there were 762 murders in the city of Chicago; the total leading number of murders in the United States with the majority being black men under forty years of age. According to the number of murders reported to the FBI based upon cities with a population of 25,000 residents and above, Chicago Heights, IL was ranked #30 on the list of murder capitals of the world in 2016. Places like Birmingham Alabama, Myrtle Beach South Carolina, Riviera Beach Florida and twenty-five other cities outranked Chicago Heights as murder capitals. For the second year in a row East St. Louis was ranked #1 with a crime index of 3%, meaning it's only safer than 3% of the cities in the United States. Chicago Heights was safer than 15% of the cities in the United States. 

   Whenever we're looking at statistics like this, coupled with sensationalized news stories, some of us could easily get the impression that Chicago is 1980's Beirut or the present day West Bank. While there is definitely a disproportionate amount of violence going on in some Chicago communities in comparison to other communities that are the same size, it's also important to keep in mind that a white person is about six times more likely to be killed by another white person than somebody black. The media's lack of coverage on this white on white violence is virtually nonexistent in comparison to its obsessive compulsion of black on black violence. Considering that propaganda we still cannot dismiss the narrative of those who live and have grown up in Chicago who see this carnage. I've lived there myself for a few months on the South Side, South Lowe to be exact, back in the early 2000's. Since that time, and with it's growing poverty and community deterioration, it's gotten much worst. Depending upon Politicians to fix it is equivalent to expecting Physicians to help regulate Big Pharma. There's no silver bullet and it requires a concerted effort of grassroots initiatives of dedicated community members to change the culture of violence in Chicago and transform its socioeconomic landscape. In the meantime, these Changemakers must survive in order to have an opportunity to strive. Here is something one of my sister's named Tanya shared that highlights some basic rules for how to survive in Chicago. Tanya is a professional hairstylist that was born, raised and currently resides in Chicago:

1. Don't sit in cars kicking it.
2. Get EVERYTHING you need and get to your destination.
3. Keep your eyes and ears open! Watch your surrounding instead of running your mouth.
4. Know who you're hanging with and what they're up to.
5. Google numbers, order your food ahead of time don't sit in local spots.
6. Track the bus if you have to ride it. That bus stop stuff is dead. Also if it does not look safe always walk a block up.
7. Don't be listening to your headphones, you gotta hear stuff.
8. Don't sit and watch when people getting rowdy KEEP IT MOVING!!
9. If you get into a confrontation assess your situation first before you snap. You never know what a person got on them. Forget being tough. Make it back home.
10. If something don't look right trust your instinct. If you hear gun shots get down quickly until it stops.
11. Don't loiter in front of the house like an easy target!! Don't run unless someone is shooting at you.
12. When in public, keep your face out of your phone, and your phone out of your face. Keep that $500 object hidden. Period.
13. Don't mix BEING CAUTIOUS with BEING SCARY. Forget what somebody thinks, make it back home to your FAMILY!!!!

   Although these survival tips relate to communities in Chicago, they are also applicable to other communities around the country and internationally. I've been to hoods in Canada these tips apply to as well. It's also worth mentioning that from 1980 to 2008, 53.3% of gang-homicides were committed by white offenders and 56.3% of gang-homicide victims were white according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. This means that there are communities that are predominately white and poor where these survival tips also apply. In fact, black people, especially males, need to follow these survival tips in any predominately white communities that are poor and especially when they're affluent. Historically there's been countless examples of blacks being racially profiled, harassed, criminalized, incarcerated, assaulted and murdered simply because they were in a white person's neighborhood. 

Peace,
Saladin