James Clark of Better Family Life was talking about “put down the pistol” before Ferguson, and then the nation and the world, started chanting, “Hands up, don’t shoot!” Clark joined the protestors in chanting to the police, “Hands up, don’t shoot!” but he also wants protestors to join him in telling youth on the street to “put down the pistol.”
“It’s good we are trying to hold the police and prosecutor and courts accountable,” Clark told The American on Thursday morning – a day, he said, he began by literally weeping over the latest flurry of street violence in North St. Louis. “But we need to hold our own community accountable as well.”
Clark said he is grieving, in particular, over the honor student shot in the eye and the 1-year-old baby shot in the stomach.
“We should not accept this level of violence in our communities, and we should not expect the police to solve all of our problems,” Clark said.
Former St. Louis comptroller and North City resident Virvus Jones said economic development, rather than police or protesting, is the only solution.
“Aristotle said, ‘Poverty is the father of crime and revolution, and crime is disorganized revolution,’” Jones said. “That’s what we are seeing in our streets. Black people are the last to recover from depressions and recessions, and our communities have not recovered. The ultimate source of street violence is economic disparity.”
Jones said that community police efforts – and any community attempt to help police itself – may have positive short-term effects, but as long as there is concentrated poverty there will be concentrated crime.
Indeed, the landmark 2014 report “For the Sake of All” (http://forthesakeofall.org/) by Washington University and Saint Louis University researchers showed that the areas of the St. Louis region with the lowest median incomes and levels of educational achievement – invariably, in north city and county – also have the highest levels of crime, as well as the poorest health indicators.
“What we need,” Jones said, “is a serious economic development plan that for once takes into account the needs of North St. Louis – city and county. For starters, we should build a Metro line that goes from south and central, where many of the jobs are, to the north. You can build it right down West Florissant.”
West Florissant Avenue was “Ground Zero” of the Ferguson protest movement.
Jones said his big-picture view does not negate the value of Better Family Life’s message of non-violence.
“Violence is not the answer,” Jones said. “Even if we understand where the violence is ultimately coming from, in terms of being humane, you have to tell people they are only feeding the problem by using violence as an alternative.”
To work with James Clark and Better Family Life on their Put Down the Pistol project, email James Clark jclark@betterfamilylife.org.
To work with Virvus Jones on economic development in north St. Louis city and county, email Virvus virvusjones@gmail.com.
