Love and Boxing: The Coach Changing Lives on Chicago's West Side
Chicago has become an almost automatic citation by police brutality apologists: when a cop kills an unarmed citizen anywhere in America and faces the backlash one rightly receives when executing a human being, the defense (if one can call it a defense) is "What about gang violence and crime in places like Chicago? People should fix their own communities before criticizing police!" And aside from the fact that this is a derailing tactic that in no way answers for out of control cops, the answer is simple: Chicagoans already are trying to address the issues of its communities, and has been for a long time. There's Chance the Rapper and his efforts to address homelessness. Black Youth Project, Kids Off the Block, and many organizations designed to end violence and achieve harmony. And then there's Jamyle Cannon.
Cannon is a teacher on the West Side of Chicago at DRW College Prep, a school where four shootings happened nearby last Monday alone, and he knows firsthand what his students are up against. Gang violence. Poverty. Food deserts. Traveling through hostile territory just to get to school. But there are other battles they face, he says, that aren't often mentioned when the media discusses the world of his kids, and he's seen that firsthand too: education inequality, its impact on the outcomes of black and brown kids, and a nation that seemingly refuses to grant them the luxury of being kids.
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Cannon is a teacher on the West Side of Chicago at DRW College Prep, a school where four shootings happened nearby last Monday alone, and he knows firsthand what his students are up against. Gang violence. Poverty. Food deserts. Traveling through hostile territory just to get to school. But there are other battles they face, he says, that aren't often mentioned when the media discusses the world of his kids, and he's seen that firsthand too: education inequality, its impact on the outcomes of black and brown kids, and a nation that seemingly refuses to grant them the luxury of being kids.
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