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April 18, 2023 - Epoch Times
20:34
100s Of Teenagers Wreak HAVOC in Chicago; Interview with Shooting Survivor
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Over the weekend, the floodgates opened up over in Chicago, where you had literally hundreds of teenagers take over the streets of downtown and go utterly wild, vandalizing property, setting cars on fire, looting and firing off guns, which is a bit weird because guns are generally illegal in Chicago.
Regardless, before we dive into the footage from this weekend, I'll mention, in case you're not aware, that Chicago is one of the most dangerous cities in the entire world.
And certainly, it's one of the most dangerous cities here in America.
In fact, for the past 11 years running, Chicago has been named the murder capital of the U.S., In fact, last year, in 2022, they had nearly 700 homicides in the city, despite the fact that the population there is just 2.6 million.
Compare that to New York City, which has a population of 8.4 million, meaning it's about three times larger, but New York City only had 438 homicides last year.
And I do say only with air quotes because New York City is also getting more and more dangerous.
But that comparison still really illustrates the point.
Chicago is in a league of its own.
In fact, when you do the math, you find that the per capita murder rate in Chicago is roughly 25 homicides for every 100,000 residents.
And when looked at globally, this makes living in Chicago, similar to living in Mexico, Colombia, or Guatemala.
Even the Central African Republic, Which is so dangerous that the State Department currently has a Do Not Travel advisory warning against it, well, their murder rate is actually significantly lower than that in Chicago.
And it's worth mentioning that the homicide rate is oftentimes a proxy to measuring other things, such as general lawlessness.
And so, along that line, as we mentioned at the top of the episode, on Saturday evening, hundreds of teenagers wreaked havoc in downtown Chicago by smashing car windows, destroying both public as well as private property, setting cars on fire, and they even attempted to enter Millennium Park, which then prompted a significant police response.
There was even a shooting amongst this chaos that resulted in multiple injuries.
You had two teenagers that were wounded by gunfire near the corner of Madison and Michigan.
Thankfully, though, they were not killed.
However, these problems, all of these homicides, the violence, the burglaries, the shoplifting, and the general lawlessness, well, they're destroying Chicago's prospect for turning things around.
That's because, after years of enduring all these problems, including a district attorney who...
Funny enough, refuse to prosecute shoplifters if they stole below $1,000 worth of merchandise.
Well, many companies are just packing up and leaving.
Taisan Foods, Boeing, Caterpillar, Citadel, Highland Ventures, they're all moving out of state.
And it's not only the white-collar jobs, because you also have giant retailers like Walmart closing half of their Chicago locations.
You have Target closing two locations, Whole Foods closing one location, and also you have Macy's, Old Navy, Uniqlo, The Gap, Timberland, Banana Republic.
All these retailers are closing down shop and moving out of the city.
Which is, naturally enough, understandable, but it's also unfortunate.
because this is essentially the exact point where the city enters a self-perpetuating feedback loop.
Broke people without career prospects shoplift with impunity, the local officials refuse to fix the problem, and the businesses, tired of being robbed for many years on end, leave the area, which makes the people who are left in the area more broke and with even less career prospects.
That is, if nothing else, a real shame.
However, there are people who are actually working to do something about it, such as Mr.
Daquan Bruce, the executive director of an organization called Concerned Communities for America.
And I actually had a chance to sit down and speak with Daquan About, for one, the story of how he himself got shot over in Chicago's South Side, but also the work that he and his organization are doing to try and improve this disaster of a situation.
And so, smash that like button, smash that subscribe button, and take a look.
Daquan, thank you so much for joining us.
Thanks for having me.
So, can you sort of set the stage and tell the audience your story of living in Chicago and perhaps how you got shot?
Yeah.
So, born and raised in Chicago on the South Side.
Grew up in a pretty...
You know, closely and tightly knit community, but, you know, the threat of violence is always like a reality.
And, you know, it's something that even though you kind of see it every day, you experience it every day, you kind of just get desensitized, kind of numb to it.
And you never really think it could happen to you until it does.
Can you tell us at this stage, you're saying there's violence around you.
What does that actually look like in practice?
Yeah, so I grew up, you know, the community I grew up in, I'll say.
It wasn't uncommon for you to hear gunshots every day.
It wasn't uncommon for you to come to school one day and you see one of your friends is no longer there because they've been killed.
It happened quite regularly, right?
I tell everybody I have so many friends who now only exist on a t-shirt because of the type of life That was around.
And it's not to say that it was all bad because it wasn't all like that.
But, you know, that was a constant reality of growing up in Chicago and it made me want something different.
You know, I thought I did everything right so that something like that could never happen to me.
But, you know, in 2018, just after I finished working in the Senate, actually the U.S. Senate, I came home.
During a sort of transition period before grad school and being home three days, I was shot in my lower abdomen.
It wasn't really a drive-by.
It was just like a guy walking down the street decided to open fire on my family.
I was shot twice in my lower abdomen right in front of the house I grew up in.
It was a bit of a...
Interesting experience because I didn't realize in the moment that I had been shot.
I just remember trying to get my family in in the house and when I turned to run I kind of fell because I couldn't feel anything from the waist down and I got in the house and I was like oh my god I've been shot and I was like oh wow like it happened.
So you were just walking down the street with your family?
Well we were all like playing outside in the in front of the house.
My younger cousin, she was 8 at the time.
She was right next to me.
Her older brother, who was maybe 18 or 19 at the time, he was on the other side.
My 5-year-old cousin was in the lawn.
My aunt and uncle were on the porch.
The whole family were just hanging out, enjoying a nice summer day outside.
That was the way it ended that day.
Who was the guy?
We never found out.
Never found out.
But about three months later, so this was August, around November of the same year, my cousin, who was pretty much like my brother, we were raised in the same household, same type of upbringing, he was actually killed behind the church that we grew up in, in our community.
And I didn't find this out until last year, actually, that the guys who murdered him We're the same guys who threatened to kill me, who shot me.
And we never brought the guys to justice, unfortunately.
Two of the four guys who were involved are actually now dead, unfortunately.
And then one I found out was paralyzed due to another shooting incident.
And then another one is in jail on a different...
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And then let's head on back to the studio.
What?
Okay, so let's talk about the mayoral race and then kind of broaden out from there.
So, you know, the mayoral race had its first round completed two days ago.
What's your take on that?
Lori Lightfoot obviously is out now.
Absolutely.
What do you make of that?
You know, this election, I've been telling people, this election, you know, one was a referendum on crime in the city, right?
Because families are, for lack of a better way of putting it, sick and tired of being sick and tired, right?
And People didn't feel safe in their communities.
They didn't feel safe going outside and engaging with their neighbors.
Kids didn't feel safe in school.
And, you know, Lori Lightfoot likes to say, oh, I inherited a bad situation.
But the reality was that when she took office in 2019, crime was on its way down.
Is that to say that, you know, things were good?
Like, no, there were still issues.
But crime was down nearly 20% across the board.
In the four years of her tenure, crime has nearly doubled, reaching generational highs if you look at carjackings, if you look at homicide rates, the highest it's ever been in my lifetime, in just four years under her leadership.
And that shows us that she did not take true Take true care of the situation that she inherited.
If she, you know, was truly a mayor of the people, she would have done everything in her power to protect the people of Chicago.
But instead, she, you know, wanted to be a national figure.
She wanted to talk about federal politics instead of listening and caring for the people in the community.
So, you know, I'll tell you, it was a great feeling going to bed knowing that she was no longer the mayor of the city.
You know, but unfortunately, we don't have much of a different option here.
You know, The people of Chicago really need a change.
And I think we're about a generation or so off from ever electing someone who's truly a conservative.
But the way we can begin to do the work in bettering our city is to hold our politicians accountable.
You know, you grew up there.
You had all these experiences, including getting shot yourself.
What do you think, realistically, is a practical way?
Because, like you said, the next mayor will come in, and, of course, they're going to promise so much.
But what are some real, on-the-ground, practical ways that you think steps that could be taken to actually reduce the amount of crime in the community?
Yeah.
So, my organization, Concerned Communities for America, We're engaged in a program that we're calling our Conversations with Black America Tour.
And what we're doing is we're going community to community and we're hosting roundtables and panel discussions with community leaders and we're talking about what are the solutions that we need to thrive, to change The current narratives in our communities.
And one of the things that we've been hearing, especially from Chicago, is that we need policies that, one, support school choice and parental rights when it comes to educating their children.
We have more than 50% of the schools across the Chicagoland area Where students are reading below their grade level.
They're graduating barely literate.
Students need an opportunity to go to a better performing school instead of being stuck in the underperforming schools that they are in.
Also, we need economic opportunity in our community.
You know, we need chances for people to become owners of the communities in which they live in by starting businesses, by getting higher paying jobs, by, you know, really having a stake in the game in that area.
And the way we do that is by embracing policies that make it easier for people to make money and easier for people to keep the money that they earn, not higher taxes.
And not over-regulation and red tape that prevents people from really earning what they are worth.
And finally, people want to hold their politicians accountable.
And for Chicago specifically, that means a firm rebuke of the soft on crime policies that people like Kim Foxx and Lori Lightfoot and others continue to push in our city.
They would rather give a slap on the wrist and give a pathway to freedom for those who continue to commit crimes against the community Instead of protecting the law-abiding citizens, you know, who are living and working and trying to raise a family in our communities because that's all they have, right?
So those are the things that the communities are telling us that they want, right?
These aren't conservative and Republican ideas.
These are homegrown ideas that when we ask people in the community, say, hey, what will make you feel better, feel safer, advanced?
This is what they're saying.
Just to push back on that a little bit, though, like, I can imagine if, let's say, you have a better program to teach reading at a higher level, or you lower taxes on businesses, so it incentivizes people to start businesses in the community.
But if I was a business, prospective business owner, I would still be reluctant if there's just so much crime.
You know what I mean?
Like, even if, like, you're getting taught reading better, like, obviously you're working in the Senate, you just come back for a few days, you still get shots, you know how to read, right?
So, I mean, like, It still seems like that wouldn't solve the fundamental issue, right?
So studies have shown that when poverty is reduced in a community, crime will subsequently be reduced.
And logically, it follows that when people have jobs, when people are earning money Then there's less time for them to be engaged in illicit activity that leads to crime.
When individuals who join gangs have access to quality education that is relevant to their lives, when they are able to get specific job training skills where they can take up a trade, or when they are able to start a business,
then those factors that led to them joining that gang, that led to them being in the streets trying to feed their families, You know, selling drugs because they can't get a job at, you know, the local, you know, 7-Eleven or they can't get a job at Amazon or what have you.
All those things go away.
They have what they need, so there's no longer a desire or a need to go and seek an alternate route to get those things.
You understand what I'm saying?
So, one, that would help build the community.
And then when we talk about rebuking the soft on crime policies, you know, Mayor Lightfoot and Kim Foxx, Put together a plan where they decided that retail thefts under $1,000, they wouldn't prosecute people for.
Essentially, you couldn't even get arrested if you stole up to something of under $1,000, right?
Well, that tells businesses that their products, their safety isn't important.
So, of course, people wouldn't want to start businesses.
Mayor Lightfoot's words were, you know, put your merchandise under lock and key if you don't want it stolen.
That's not leadership at all, right?
If you enforce hard-on-crime policies that tell those who wish to do crime that, hey, if you commit a crime, no matter how small, you will be brought to justice.
You will be held accountable.
That, in turn, deters people from committing crimes.
And if you have both those things working together, Economic opportunity, mixed with hard-on-crime policies, mixed with a government that is making it easy for individuals to earn and keep the money that they earn, you're going to see crime drop significantly.
I would say an example is...
You know, when I was growing up, the City of Chicago instituted a program, a summer youth work program, because what was happening was during the school, during the months that students were off of school, you had a dramatic rise in the amount of shootings and shooting deaths of young people age 18 and under.
It was like a 12 to 15 percent increase during the out-of-school time.
They implemented this program that allowed young people from all across the city with particular involvement from the west and south sides of the city where I'm from, the south side.
And those numbers dramatically decreased within a year.
You know, you have more young people earning a paycheck, you know, working a steady job and, you know, being able to have a life and see a different part of the city.
That's also key.
Many people don't know that Chicago is a very segregated city.
You know, I went a large part of my life never going north of the south loop.
You know, but when you have that opportunity, then those young people's lives were saved.
You know, people got experiences that they never would have gotten.
So we know that it is economic empowerment, it is hard on crime policies, and it is a government that makes it easier for people to thrive that will reduce crime.
And now lastly, over on Epic TV, we just published an awesome documentary called Altered Humans, How Biotech is Changing Who We Are.
It's a movie which delves deep into the recent innovations in gene editing, in reproductive technologies, as well as in what you can call longevity innovations.
And it explores the question of what all these new technologies will actually do to the meaning of the question of what it means to be a human.
Here's a trailer.
Medicine has moved from making us well to making us better than well.
Bigger, faster, stronger, smarter, to even make human beings, in a sense, superhuman.
The big product of the 21st century are going to be bodies and minds.
If you take a genetic editing, just as an example, it's you who are changed.
This new gene editing technology known as CRISPR is to genetics and genetic technologies what the atomic bomb was to physics.
It's like doing surgery with an axe.
We're taking genetically modified organisms and we're injecting them in little kids arms.
We just shoot them right into the vein.
It's experimental for a reason.
If you want to be a lab rat, go for it.
I was.
It's not for you.
None of these things are for you.
They don't exist for the good of humanity.
That was not the main point.
We simply cannot be dismissive of our place as human beings in this world.
People that the gods wish to destroy, they give enormous power.
And these guys are seeking enormous power.
I think we are heading towards the upgrading of homo sapiens into gods.
That's why I think it's the biggest scam of all time.
It is the biggest scam of all time.
and we're living in it.
If you'd like to check out that awesome documentary as well as the plethora of other great content that we have over on Epic TV, our no censorship video platform, the link will be right there at the very top of the description box.
Just click on that link, and you can head on over and watch the documentary today.
Again, that link right there at the top of the description box.
I hope you check it out.
And then, until next time, I'm your host, Roman from the Epic Times.
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