After being in prison for 30 years, Victor Ali doesn’t want to see anyone follow in his footsteps of being a “hard-headed kid who didn’t listen to his mother” and got caught up in street violence.
“So many of our youth are taking early trips to prison forever or ending up in the graveyard,” Ali said. “If you are a loose screw on society, the devil’s going to get you.”
When Ali got out of prison a year and a half ago, he immediately joined local activist Brother Anthony Shahid in educating youth at schools, jails and in the community about the grave consequences of street violence. He joined the Tauheed Youth Group, a mentoring group for high-risk, African-American young men and women that Shahid founded in the 1980s. Ali has since met several other mentors who “have straightened their lives out due to Brother Shahid,” he said.
From April 6-9, Ali will join thousands of people whose lives Shahid has touched at the Tauheed Youth Group Reunion. Most of the weekend’s events are open to the public, and Shahid encourages the community to get involved.
The weekend’s main event will be a massive street patrol on Saturday, April 8 from 5 p.m. to midnight, when Shahid said thousands of black men from throughout the country will hit the streets to address the issue of violence head-on.
“When children can’t come out to play, that’s punishment,” Shahid said. “Something is wrong with that picture. We are going to take back our streets. When you see these 10,000 men around the country hit the streets, you’re going to know the black man is back.”
Shahid is calling on black men to come and meet at 5 p.m. on Saturday, April 8 at Vashon High School, 3035 Cass Ave., and the street patrol will start at 7 p.m.
At the same time on that Saturday, Shahid is calling on 10,000 women to participate in what he calls a “social media prayer takeover,” asking women to send out prayers via social media that “not a single shot be fired that night and bless the men to come back home.”
He is also asking women to send out prayers from now until April 8 for 10,000 men to participate in the street patrol.
The weekend will kick off with a social event for youth-group alumni at Vashon High School on Thursday, April 6 – which is the only exclusive event of the weekend. A Jumar prayer service will take place at 1 p.m. on Friday, April 7 at the Cochran Community Center, 818 Cass Ave.
Shahid will also host an Honoring Our Heroes awards dinner from 6-9 p.m. on Friday, April 7 at Better Family Life, 5415 Page Blvd. Then Shahid will give a final address from 1-5 p.m. on Sunday, April 9 at Harris-Stowe State University, 3026 Laclede Ave. All events are free, except for the banquet.
For more than 30 years, Shahid has mentored youth in jails three times a week, mentored in dozens of schools, worked to bring jobs to the community and mediated discrimination cases at several large companies, Shahid said. He’s reached out to families whose loved ones fell to gun violence and police-involved shootings. He also stood by Michael Brown Jr.’s family in Ferguson after Brown’s death and led several protests and marches in the following months.
For the past 18 months, Shahid has been working on this reunion – not with the idea that it would be a one-weekend thing.
“We are going to sustain it,” Shahid said.
For too long, women have been left to carry the heavy loads in the black community, Shahid said. He will be asking men to get involved in keeping up the community’s schools and mentoring. He will be asking businesses to take on apprentices to help the youth gain employable skills. He has a whole list of calls to action that he will reveal in his address on April 9, he said.
James Clark, vice president of community outreach at Better Family Life Inc., has participated in the youth group since its early beginnings.
“I’m excited to see some brothers I haven’t seen in 10-15 years,” Clark said, “but I’m more excited about the charge and the challenge that Anthony Shahid is going to put on black men.”
For more information about the Tauheed Youth Group Reunion and to register for events, visit https://tauheed43.wixsite.com/tauheedreunion or call 327-0271. Also visit https://www.facebook.com/TauheedYouthGroup/. To purchase the $60 banquet tickets, call Ernest Muhammad at 314-312-9814.
