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Sunday, August 7, 2016

A letter to Parents: Stop raising assholes

This is a letter about a very personal experience with 2 groups of people of the similar heritages and how our current group of parents has failed one of them.

Today we were at an all day soccer tournament for our son. 15 fields of games running for nearly 10 hours for ages ranging 7-22 years old. It was a grueling 90 degrees outside and the space of time in between games was tough. In any case the sponsoring companies tried to entertain the attendees with sugar, nutrition-less foods, and zombie entertainment.

One of the aspects of the sport that drew me in was that in our area, soccer is predominately Latino. We get to be around people of similar cultures. My son gets to hear our ethnic language daily, hence he is forced to learn or be lost on the field. I am excited. He loves it. So, I gladly play practice chauffeur and attend games. Even if the cultures aren't identical to ours, I feel like it's still similar and I like this for us.

Today was no different. However, there was an observation I made that my partner and I Joe constantly discuss - the lack of discipline and respect amongst the younger generation. We sound like our parents.

We're picnic'ed under a tree waiting in between games. We happen to be behind a small stage, a sectioned off area that's entertaining the crowd. We can't even see what's happening but we hear everything. Our chairs and blanket are barely 12 inches away from the barricade and that was on purpose so we can block off our little corner. As my daughter is playing on her blanket, a group of players come right by our area, stand in between our blanket and the barricade, stepping on our blanket, no regard to our presence, let alone an attempt to move and adjust their position, trying to get a closer look at the mini stage instead of just going around to the front, forcing my daughter to be uncomfortable and stand up from where she has been for the past 2 hours. Naturally, my partner stands up, taps the closest player and says, 'You're stepping on our blanket. Can you move? There's space to your left and to your right, and you're hovering right over us." The player moves his feet and replies "There, I moved" and turns away while laughing. My partner then proceeds to tell him he is being disrespectful, and tempers beings to rise. The player doesn't take this confrontation seriously and he laughs in my partners face. My partner quickly makes him understand he can't disrespect just anyone. An altercation. "Chill out. He's just a kid!" Someone yells.

An hour later, we moved to another part of the field. This time we are surrounded by another team of soccer players. Now, the day before, my son and I saw this group come up to registration, in a 2 line formation, with their coach in the front. They were all attentive, they were all dressed in similar colors to represent their team and while their coach handled business their remained in their 2 lines. I heard thanks you, and yes sir, yes ma'am. Once they were registered they walked away in that same two line formation. I was in awe and I immediately looked up their team name. A group of Latino decent as well, appearing to be about 18 years old, but from a different country from the earlier group we were near. So in our new picnic spot, I realize I am seated next to a player who I apologize for being too close to, and he insists I don't move, because I am okay. In fact, he moved his position even though I had just gotten there. A short while later, 2 other of those team members were casually playing with their soccer ball about 20 feet from us, not an uncomfortable distance to me as I am use to this and I feel safe, but one of their teammates stops them and says, in Spanish to move further away because they were too close to the lady and her daughter - me. Another short while later, we witness the coach serving the players food after a game, and once again instead of the teens crowding around their coach in unorganized chaos, they line up in single line, and patiently wait their turn for their share of home made food. Enjoying and appreciating their take with gusto.

So what's the discussion. Here's my letter.

Dear Parents,

We have a generation of children who are inconsiderate, unaware, unconscious and rude. Somehow it was made okay to not be mindful or even kind to those around you. Further more, it was made acceptable to be disrespectful to elders since we don't know them. And we have no regards to admitting mistakes and apologizing for them/correcting our behavior when we need to. We somehow think "He's just a kid" is an acceptable excuse for disrespectful and even unlawful behavior from youngsters. And I don't get how this even occurs from my generation.

The two groups of people I had to deal with today come from cultures who have been savaged, slaughtered and enslaved. These two groups of players share similar ethnic histories and cultural rituals. Both teams are based is lower-low middle class NYC neighborhoods. We share the same tongue and we even enjoy the same foods. Yet, I feel like we Latinos tend to be the least supportive culture. We compete too much against each other instead of figure out ways to empower and help each other. We're too worried about how we can out-work, out-house, out-spouse our neighbor because somehow that validates our struggles and success. Instead of sharing the information we obtain in order to help our our community get a little more ahead as we are trying too. Therefore our teachings have been skewed and our values have been compromised.

And now, we have created a generation of young adults who don't even have the courtesy to be mindful of their own physical presence in relation to how it affects those around them. One of the most basics teachings of socializing and behaving in public: Respect other people's personal space.

We have failed that first group of kids. And they will fail their kids. And the cycle will continue.

As a Mother to a Son, I know all too well, If I don't teach my son to be a Man, the street will. And my definition and the streets' definition of how to be a Man in our society is very different. Common courtesy doesn't cost anything. Kindness doesn't cost anything. Respecting our elders is a benefit to us for their wisdom is priceless.

I hope to one day meet the coach of the 2nd group in order to thank him for the work he is doing with his players. Some may call the situations I described of his group as controlling and militant. I believe it's more like disciplined and respect. Each of those team members represent their entire team and because of how they behaved in our presence, I won't ever forget either of their team names, but they'll be remembered for 2 very different reasons.

I often feel hopeless and helpless because I want to shout from the rooftops at how negligent my generation of parents have been and how our irresponsible parenting is the cause of much of the chaos we see being shared online.

I can only implement values and practices in my home to ensure I have done my job as apparent to raise a respectable man, and an equally respectable woman. And someday I hope to bump into likeminded Mothers who maybe have some insight as to how we can change this all around for our cultures.

-Me

Sunday, July 17, 2016

We come from the same place

No matter what faith you follow, what God you pray to, what ideologies you have, what race you are, what knowledge you've learned, or what wealth you've obtained...

We ALL come into this world the same way. And we all leave this world the same way.

GO INSIDE

Friday, July 8, 2016

#AltonSterling ‪#‎PhilandoCastile‬

I am trying REALLY hard to go about my business while making sense of all this because in a few hours I have to have a talk about it with the Children. I have yet to share or explain any of this to our Children because I'm not the "Oh, there are big bad scary people in the world that do really mean things, just ignore what you see" type of parent. Or some parents have suggested to "shut of all TV and internet until this passes over". That's ridiculous to me.

Our truth is, we are Parents of a teenage Son and a 10 year old Daughter in a social media time. We are Parents who are active visitors of the community spaces in our neighborhood, and we live in an urban area, this doesn't just pass over. Where sirens are normal, those blue and red lights are every day, and being pulled over on the way to the grocery store is typical, this is real ALL THE TIME. And it's scary.

But what's more scary is the ugliness, the ignorance, the pure hate that's been on my feed all day, and all night, and all day again. The incomprehensible acts of violence & revenge is hard to take in or even accept. But the amount of pure stupidity that's ravaging MY GENERATION turns my stomach.

Those that are "shocked" by whats going on, really? You're shocked? Shame on you. Because there are neighborhoods that live through this every single day STILL and not a damn care is given until you see it on your news feed. The ONLY reason we know of these tragic circumstances is because of social media, but truth indeed this has been and will continue to occur for a long time.

My only hope is that somehow, we come together, as a people, and support each other, build, help, encourage, teach, and nurture. Because as it stands right now, we are failing -> Putting each other down, posting outrageous videos (and watching) on World Star as PROOF that we are disrespecting our Women, raising irresponsible Men, idolizing things and curated celebrities, giving ALL of our money to those that want to keep us 'poor', celebrating in histories that slaughtered those before us... THEY are laughing at us. Because it's exactly what THEY want.

None of this makes us stronger, wiser, or even capable to breed the next generation of fighters, of activists, of Juniperos, Ms Baez's, Macolm Xs, Dr Kings, Mrs Parks, Mandelas. Because our Childrens' world is going to need a whole lot of them in order to make a dent in this bullshit that's going on. We - as a generation - we need a spiritual detox. We need to stop supporting the crap that's meant to keep us under. We need to stop BUYING into all that's being created to keep us at status quo. And we need, for heavens sake, we need to have honest conversations with our children about what's happening now, on how to respect one another, how to be compassionate and understanding, how to STAND UP for one another. Because we sure as hell aren't doing that for ourselves.

We have the power of a world wide network, and what do we do with the Internet? Spread the bullshit even further.

If we can raise a better generation of children, perhaps we can raise a more intelligent people, a more intelligent policing system, a more intelligent governing structure, a more Courageous group of human beings, a more spiritual and conscious persons, that will finally put an end, or at least strike an improvement to all the sadness that we live in.

Perhaps I am just wishfully thinking, but look at your news feed... What else is there to do? Just bypass THOSE updates, right?!

We failed, miserably. But they don't have to.

Now let me get back to figuring out how to explain to a 13 yr old and 10 year old that a man was killed while being pulled over for a broken tail light (something we've been pulled over for), another man was killed while out selling CDs (something our neighbor does), and 5 others were killed because the world was mad about it all, and didn't know how else to respond (we get mad all the time!). But we should never be worried about any of those things happening to us. (?!?!?)

You know what they're going to say?
That Our country needs a fkn time out.