Young Bitter and Black

Published: 22/11/2008

Young, Fighting and Black
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown and Daniel James Henry

Lewis Hamilton became the world racing champ and the nation rejoiced. What an inspiration they said, the first black man to break through speed and race barriers.
( In truth he is mixed race, as is Barak Obama, for many a specious distinction. Black pride holds the two aloft, lays claim to them). It is a rare moment of affirmation for men and boys who racially identify with these heroes. They are momentarily freer to breathe and imagine. How weary they are, bearing the burdens of collective blame, struggling against low societal expectations, and having to daily tear off the wounding tags stuck on to young males whose features reveal an African ancestry.

Chris Wilson 45, black educationalist who has had stunning success getting young black kids into top academic institutions feels their pain: ’It is very demoralising because there is an exaggeration of negative stereotypes, over dramatisation. Nothing is put into context or perspective’

Says Shaun Bailey, Tory candidate for Hammersmith: ‘We are represented in the media horribly. Only terrorists are represented as badly. We are shown as sexy, dangerous and exotic. We are either guilty or victims and if we are victims it is at another black man’s hand. You’ve got entire TV channels set up to celebrate everything that is bad in our community. I despair. These portrayals make black men believe that’s what they are.’

The press is no better. Newspapers circulate these negative images, glamourising them even. It sells the papers. When a group feels it is put upon, it will behave worse. So the papers run more stories. Academic Ken Monrose, 40, an academic believes there it is a self fulfilling prophecy- people becoming what they think they are expected to be. The young, gifted ( or at least hopeful) and black have turned to the young, bitter and black, partly because they cannot bear the degeneration of their own, partly because of how they are almost expected to follow this destiny.

Joseph Harker 45, of the Guardian knows well these embedded (unjust) values:’ The stories write themselves. We cannot ignore the fact that of 27 people killed this year, 24 were black. But there is a racial dimension to the reporting. If the victim is black it must be gangs so move on, it’s been explained . If it’s Ben Kinsella or Rob Knox, the thinking is Gosh this could happen to any one of “us”. White fatalities get three times as much coverage than black fatalities.’

Aashreil James, 19, from Leeds, Chappletown studies music, loves music:’ Its kind of depressing to be honest. A black youth will get killed an straightaway it will be drug related . It makes me think if I was to die tomorrow would the media or police tell my mum that it was gang related even though I m not involved in gangs? ‘

Young RD, 18, has knifed kids in his time. For him the media drama after a gang killing is like ‘Diana’s funeral man, makes us feel big. Those flowers and candles, and people crying. Its like the best film. Sometimes I just want to go out there and do something big.’

RD’s mum is the archetypal, strong, hard working lone Caribbean mother. An independent midwife she has a daughter who is training to be a physiotherapist and the lad who gives her grief: ‘ I don’t know here he’s going to end up this boy. Only seventeen, he likes to hurt. Nearly died one when someone went for him with broken glass. Twenty three stitches on his arm. Last year he tried to knife me and I nearly called the police. If I did he would be finished, end up like the rest, in and out of prison. His sister won’t live with us no more. Then he cries like a baby’. RD is listening and looks slightly ashamed. But he doesn’t contradict his mum.

Comedian and actor Richard Blackwood 36, believes to blame only the messengers is denial:’ To a degree media representations are accurate. Not a hundred per cent true but I don’t like it when my race tries to act as if there isn’t a problem. The truth of the matter is that we black people know what our demons are. A lifestyle starting to form among our young. Even muggers are packing up because they are afraid to walk the streets – what if they are attacked by 12 or 14 kids and kicked to death? ’

Noel Clarke, 31, the director of the critically acclaimed Kidulthood is as candid :
’These kids have been demonised but at the same time you can’t make excuses for their behaviour. I am sitting here today because I focussed on what I want to do. I decided to make films, not smoke weed or do bad. You have got to make things happen. There’s only so much you can go ”everyone’s against me” It could be the case. But do something about it’.

Accomplished black men cannot, it seems, sit back and enjoy personal success. The lot of the rest matters too much and they care, have to. Their emotional engagement with their race is remarkable, unique.

The tragic rise of lethal stabbings and fatal shootings among their own is at its nadir. Figures from the Crime and Justice survey show that only 7% of youngsters in total commit crime and of them a small percentage are violent. But black and mixed race males start early, kill and die too young – some only eleven years old. These crimes are more gruesome and nihilistic than fiction ever is.

The options are stark as young men are either ‘badmen’ or ‘bounties’ – acting white.

Zaiben Hunter, 15 and Justin Austin, 14, go to secondary schools in Haringey. They are at that critical junction, deciding. ‘Shotting’ (selling drugs) and robbing people would reward them quicker than going through the education system and conforming to society. Justin admits he has been tempted, but has held back:’ Its like everyone is doing it and it is kind of exciting as well. If you have a ‘badman’ friend you feel protected.’

Both boys say their families keep them on the right track: ‘They don’t want me to get involve those sorts of things. If we were to go against them it would be like committing treason against yourself’ But it isn’t easy says Justin: ‘Your personality changes depending on who you are with. If you are with someone who says they want a new phone and they are going to go out robbing today, your mindset will automatically change. You will think like them, looking for revenge, respect, things.’

In some localities in our major cities a fog of terror has descended. People walk fast with their heads bowed. Even the Alsatians on leashes seem cowed and everything is unnaturally silent, awaiting the next scream or shot perhaps.

We tried to talk to some residents on an estate in west London. They rushed away and a posse of five warned us off- youngsters, tense and volatile whose orders felt like razor cuts. One followed us to the waiting minicab, a hoodie. His disembodied voice was just breaking: ‘What the fuck? Don’t know what you’re messin with. Come back, come on and you’re dead Paki’. All these urban cowboys were black or mixed race.
The cab driver exploded with racist abuse ‘Those blacks bastards are all the same, all criminals, half mad druggies. Never pick them up. Why you want to talk to them?’

Travel on public transport and you see how people shrink away from kids and young males who have Afro hair and dark skins. Happens to the suave Labour minister David Lammy too: ‘On the rare occasions when I am not working and I m on the street I too experience somebody crossing the road because they think I am carrying a knife.’

Even empathetic anti-racists have had it. One white comrade once led marches against police brutality through Deptford and ran a youth club when it was possible to have faith in redemption and table tennis. No longer:
‘ They’re psychos. Know nothing, want everything, no brain, all body and blades- Mad Max aliens. They don’t care about anyone, not even their mums.’ They, them, those, the whole lot damned. As ever when it comes to race, crimes committed by individuals and groups always become part of a generic pathology, a racial characteristic, predestination.

Imagine how it feels then to be a goodie not a hoodie, one of the many who strive to do their best for themselves and society. Prejudices stalk them, relentlessly as do enticements to join the wild side.

Samuel, got his A levels, a place at Bristol to study English, wanted to be a writer. He was beaten up almost every week on his way to and back from school. He had no mates among the local black kids in Peckham and had a breakdown. But he got himself up and will be going to an American university next year. ‘You can dream those dreams there’.

Here they pull you down, or try to. Aml Ameen AGE the actor who made his mark on The Bill still gets pigeonholed:’ One of the redtops – they interviewed me. They angled certain questions on my life, asked if I had ever been in trouble with the police ? No. Grown up in a kind of gang culture? No. They wanted a certain kind of violin story, a damaging story that’s not my life. So they didn’t print the story’

If all attention goes to the bad guys, the good guys must feel like giving up. What’ more, the highest achievers, says Monroe, find barriers: ‘Avenues are blocked for black men to express themselves so they look for alternatives and adopt that. ‘

That blockage can happen early. Chuka Ummata, 30, the charismatic lawyer, and prospective Labour candidate was written off at eight. His parents were advised the child would not pass his GCSEs and that university was not an option. His mother sent him off to a fee paying school. Ummata knows he was lucky’ That inequality of opportunity- I understood that early. I made good, but a disproportionate number of young black males do not’.

The system is still loaded against them says Chris Wilson:’ Certain stereotypes are hard to break. We have teachers who will not write references for children applying for Oxbridge. So these bright ones are sabotaged by people who are middle class and feel only they can go to Oxbridge.’

However, more possibilities are opening up for black men; they use the internet, talk to the world and will not be held down. Not forever.
Regie Yates 25, is a successful TV presenter. Pumped full of full of confidence, doing it his way:’ If you continue to ask for handouts things won’t change. Start to stand up for ourselves things happen. Failure for me is not an option. I have to succeed. I had to work my arse off to get here’.

Same for Aml, who, like many others wants to pass the message. Success brings burdens, personal and communal:’ ‘I don’t want a friggin handout. They shouldn’t. We need to up our IQ I want to feel I earned my way so I can stand up as a man. I work hard, diligently. We are psychologically chained.’

It is never easy to break the chains.
How do women feel about their male counterparts? Laura Pembele, 22 wants to be a surgeon. Her views are unexpectedly harsh:’ A lot of them are involved in gun crime, knife crime, Troublesome. There aren’t a lot of good black role models out there. They’re just players, thinking about girls, drinking, cars, never settling down or giving back to society. Even the guys at Uni- they think it is OK to get a third class degree ’ With kith and kin like this what chance do the lads have?

Bianca Gill, 22, is more understanding:’ It is unfortunate that a lot of black men are seen as ignorant, aggressive, cheating and nine times out of ten they aspire to be like that because they think that’s what women want from them.’ And many black women go for the bullshitting and macho brothers, like Elmina, 21, a budding actress and moll of successive gangsters: ’These tough ones make you feel like a real woman, won’t take nothing’. Two men fought over her three years ago and one lost his eye. Elmina take that to be her value, her trophy.

Corrine DaCosta, 22, new mum believes this is: ’one of the main reasons that these black guys go round shooting each other. It’s usually down to a girl. My ex- boyfriend’s best mate, got into a fight with another guy over a girl. He was only meeting her- and he shouldn’t have been because he had a girlfriend but anyway-he ended up in prison for murder because of it.’

The world out there for young people in general encourages the fast life observes Richard Blackwood, ‘We are all turned on by power as are these kids. Its just that they don’t have the ethics behind it. It’s power without the instruction manual. We are in trouble with this generation because they already have it in their minds that they should be respected for all the wrong reasons. ’

The lack of consistent and joint parenting is a persistent problem. Ameen is convinced that makes a difference:’ I lived in Hackney for the first years if my life and my dad did his fuckin job to get us out of that environment that he could see was becoming volatile. He did his job as man and I am forever grateful for that’. 59 percent of Caribbean boys, says David Lammy are raised by lone mothers:’ It’s tough - my mum did that. We have the notion of “babyfathers”, as if it is normal to have children with three or four different women. Fatherhood and masculinity is an issue for our community’

Single dad Martin, 51 a criminologist, didn’t meet his dad till his was 31:‘Am I truly over it? I have probably found a coping strategy, but I am still psychologically affected by that absence. There are a variety of reasons why fathers aren’t there-death, prison, health, emotionally indifference. I got a focus group of 12 young black offenders in Feltham to do a survey on their number one issue. It was fatherhood. Not black history, not education, but fatherhood. Father deficit, leaves a hole, sets up a series of needs that need to be satisfied, hence gang culture, the extended family’

Monrose, though, found that; ’ beyond the misogyny, the aggression there are many other aspects to black masculinity. Many can be family orientated, have great pride in their children, fight against the bombardment of alienation, deprivation and oppression. All this pressure that is heaped on them and still they push on’. That perseverance remains unrecognised.

Take college student John Moss, AGE: ‘ Really and truly I didn’t want to be like the black male stereotyped nowadays, those involved in stabbings, shootings, police raids, drugs. So I dress differently from how I used to before, smart, look decent and now I don’t have that much trouble because first impressions count.’ Respect and stay the course.
Michael Manning, 24, a researcher for the Ministry of Justice also does what it takes to get by in the professional world.
‘I have learnt is to always smile, always be extremely polite, sometimes you have to fake laugh, or raise the pitch of your voice so that people are made aware that you are not threatening or aggressive. The stereotype of black people being aggressive means that to be taken seriously you have break that.’

Remmal McKenzie, 21, used to be a gang member, went to prison: ‘ I grew up around hoodlums, blocks everywhere, surrounded. From when I was five years old, I’m seeing people getting bashed, seeing guns drawn on people.’ Now he does community work to save others turn them back, even trains the police on sensitive and effective policing: ‘ say to the kids Racism goes on and that but get your grades, no-one can take that away. That’s your evidence. If your way is to achieve something? ‘

Craig Green, 21 got that evidence: ‘I go to bed thinking I’ve got a job, I’m at Uni, I m’ not on road, I’m not drugged up, I’m not dead’. Born into Thatcher’s Britain, his mum chose his name carefully: ’She didn’t call me Jerome or Jermaine, all those black symbolic names because hen applying for a job you would be rejected’ She instilled in him the work ethic he says: ’People come in from Poland, Afghanistan and make good money. How is it that a black man think he can’t do the same and he was born here?’ Black boys have no fire in their eyes- they are just glum and moody and just want to take’

Craig’s mum Coral Pearce, another lone mother, remembers Craig wanting to be white when he was five, with blue eyes, because it was easier. ‘ I say to Craig, I know you are upset about your dad but he didn’t understand what’s important. If he did he’d be here. I just want my son, to think positively.’ Mums, you repeatedly find, are the heroes of this story.

Do male role models inspire? Apparently not. Famous black men have moved too far away from the ghetto. Shawn Bailey believes he can still connect:’ I speak the lingo, I’m the lingo. I come from Ladbroke Grove; I come from the road and I make that obvious. I come from a very poor black background, single mum, ordinary education and then the army’ Which made a man of him.

There are new migrations taking place. Some are abandoning the badlands and others are walking deeper into the bloody chaos.
Mckenzie understand exactly these dilemmas:’ I know a young person whose led exactly my life, I want to show him the whole game, break it down, listen to me, don’t be stubborn. There’s lots of people who have gone through it before you, straps
( guns) didn’t arrive yesterday. Shanks ( knives) didn’t come yesterday. Gangsterism all that the only new thing is the slang’

Sir William Atkinson runs the beacon Phoenix School with boys just like Justin and Zeiban. The school walls celebrate his pupils, those who came up, turned themselves around. It is an astonishing sight, these galleries of affirmation. Last year they had a prom night at the Hilton in Mayfair. His school has the highest of expectations even for the most damaged and angry of children. It works.

Will Justin and Zeiban opt for deferred gratification or will they succumb to the lure of cheap thrills and ill gain? They have a greater chance today than ever before of making it. And have never been in more danger. Inspiring this generation to choose the right way, says Atkinson, is the biggest challenge for today’s black Britons.

Published in The Independent Saturday Magazine