A Lost Generation?

Headline: 4 Teenage Boys Stomp and Kill a 5th teenager at Party


I literally felt sick to my stomach, bile rose to my throat and tears immediately flooded my eyes after reading that headline and the horrific details that followed.

A promising eighteen-year-old life was senselessly taken at a metro Atlanta party Saturday night. The young man was enjoying his carefree youth, attending a house party, didn’t even know the perpetrators and his life was crudely snatched away by a pack of thuggish, rogue, ignorant savages. Who raises this type of person? How does this type of person come into existence?

One of the young men (and I use that term very loosely) was quoted as saying, “I’m going to hit the next person I see.” Unfortunately it ended up being a helpless, 5 feet six inch, 125 pound young man who was minding his own business. The four young men proceeded to stomp and kick this young man to death, at a party, in front of partygoers. No one helped him. Totally disgusting.

This scene has played out over and again, in cities and states all across America, just change the names, but the color remains the same. Remember Chicago? It makes me so angry and so very sad! It breaks my heart. Wake up! Wake the hell up! Can’t you see the self-destruction you are leaving in your midst? Do you hate yourself that much that you have to destroy your own image? Black on black crime is destroying our communities.

We have lost a generation of young men who have fallen by the wayside. And personally, I don’t think they will ever recover and stand up like the tall oak they were meant to be. However, I pray that they will. They have no respect for themselves, no respect for women, no respect for the children they carelessly bring into the world and discard. . . bottom line, a human life means nothing to them.

This is validated time and time again when they act out in this destructive way, emulate and idolize rappers, murders and thieves, wear their pants below their waists and show not an ounce of respect for their elders. They would rather rob, maul and steal than make a way for themselves in this world, but instead stand behind the rallying cry of “the man owes them.” Nobody owes you shit. Stand and make a way for yourself the same way everyone else does.

I pity them. I despite them. And mostly I fear them.

I never thought I would see the day when I would be afraid to walk past a group of young men assembled in the streets. It shouldn’t be this way. I hate with everything in me that it is this way. Don’t they know they are the descendants of kings from Africa? They should walk, head held high, in greatness and pride.

I never thought I would see the day when I would bow my head in shame at a young man exposing his underwear and ass in a public arena. My heart splits in two. Why would you want to emulate a dress code worn by prisoners, gay prisoners as a means of identifying you will have sex with another man? Don’t you see the images on the evening news and know what the nation, the world, thinks of you? Rise up and destroy those images.

Free T.I. Free Gucci Mane. Free Bobby Brown. Remember those cries? When did it become cool to glorify bad behavior? When did it become cool to have street cred? Hell, they committed the crime, so their asses needed to stay right where they were. In jail. I hate that. . . free such and such. . . for what? You commit the crime, you do the time baby. These are grown ass men who have been given extraordinary opportunities to succeed. For every action there is a reaction and a consequence. Why should they get a pass?

I have a son, a teenage son, and I worry about him---not because he is a bad child, because he is most definitely not. In fact, he is my hope for the future. . . a hope that others like him (the future Obamas) will show the world their true strength, intelligent and integrity towards family, their communities and their God.

On the contrary, I worry about him because of who and the kind of toxic element he encounters and is exposed to on a daily basis. That is my fear, that he will be at the right place at the wrong time surrounded by one of them.

The gang of boys that killed that poor child and destroyed his family in the process, in my opinion they are trash, meant to be spit upon. They have no moral upbringing and are a bunch of savage predators who prey on the weak. They are vacant vessels simply existing in our world with empty minds and even emptier hearts and souls. I'm sure if you looked within their eyes, the gateway to the soul, they would be dead. They are a pack of cowards who deserve every punishment they receive and even then, that still will not be enough.

I am sooooo angry! And more of us need to become angry. Where were the men in their lives? I challenge our real men to rise up and lead. Reach one, teach one. A woman cannot turn a boy into a man. Real men take back your families and restore them to greatness.

I am worried about the state of our families for generations to come when this is what our future protectors, providers, head of households, etc. will teach a new generation of young men. Lord be with us. Be with them. I fear for the future of our society when this is the world my children will become adults in.

And an even sadder dilemma is that I don’t have an answer on how to solve it. Do you?