Downloaded from YTS.MX
Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX
[Shamont] A lot of people from Chicago
do not like Chicago
for some reason, for all the violent stuff.
But at the same time, though, Chicago is so--
so decent and so pretty.
I never been nowhere else, so I'm thinkin' I know
what a city like ours, I don't know.
I love my city.
What's up, Joe?
Come by the church sometime, man.
Hallelujah, eh, man.
Whaddup, head?
- He gon' start. - Whaddup, head?
Oh, he know how to get a laugh.
I don't know who these people is.
Big white dude right here.
This guy's like, "Whaddup." Cool.
Big ass white dude.
Because the church right here, no nothing--
no nothing really happen by the church.
But down that way...
Past Madison, I'll say a couple of blocks down that way,
yeah, we be going up.
And down that way, right-- right there,
you'd be going up, too.
That way, it be cracking there, like, a lot of violence,
a lot of e'erything and shit.
[siren blares]
[anchor] Chicago faces an epidemic of gun violence.
This year alone, more than 2,100 people have been shot.
[anchor 2] Chicago has seen more homicides
than New York and Los Angeles combined.
[anchor 3] Most of the shootings
took place in poor neighborhoods,
far from downtown.
What's up, y'all? You all right?
[anchor 4] Before the weekend, a gang roundup.
[anchor 5] 61 of the 101 people arrested early Friday
were documented gang members, the police said.
[Billy] What's up, man?
You know, people look at these young men
as being a problem.
Man, they're actually the solution,
if you give them a chance.
[traffic din]
People are dying around us on a daily basis.
Every day we turn on the news,
and how many times we hear about shootings
and people getting killed?
Y'all gonna come in here
with stories about people you know personally,
Man, heaven forbid
y'all become one of them stories.
[siren blaring]
The MAAFA Redemption Project is a ministry of this church.
Trying to create a support system for you.
[Billy] It's a great opportunity, man.
Because you were selected out of 187 applicants.
How many people have shot in here?
Raise your hand.
More than half of the room.
Anybody that been to prison, raise your hand.
[Marshall] A lot of these conditions,
on the West Side, in Chicago...
that we grew up in, we didn't create.
[Billy] The system is designed to what?
- Right? - [Billy] Break us.
You got to be man enough,
man to be protectors of your community.
The only way you do that
is start building yourself up first.
[Marshall] Welcome to a new beginning.
Doesn't matter what you did in the past.
What matters is today.
There's going to be a lot of struggles,
but the whole point is moving forward.
There is no moving forward without struggle.
All right, brothers.
I'm going to read off a scenario.
If you feel that that scenario is morally right,
you will stand on this side of the room.
If you feel it's morally wrong,
you're going to come to this side of the room.
If you really can't decide one or the other
and you're kind of in the middle,
then you can stay in the middle, all right?
"Your friend is on the bus
and sees someone who he recognizes from being
in an opposing gang's music video.
Your friend sneaks up behind the guy
and hits him in the head with a baseball bat."
Morally right, morally wrong, or you in the middle.
[chattering]
Try to be honest, guys. Be honest with yourself.
I want y'all to come over here, even y'all in the middle,
cause y'all gotta-- Y'all on the fence
about whether it's right or wrong.
Come on, now.
'Cause if you think you can justify
Shorty getting bashed in his head,
just because he wanted to be in the music video--
It's not right-- It is not right,
but it is, to a certain state.
You got to look at how this person feeling.
[Billy] So, the consequences for the action
- is prison time. - [man] Yeah, that's true.
You got to just even throw up gang signs,
or show no guns, none of that,
'cause they can still be with it even though they dancing.
So, you never know.
I want to elaborate on that,
'cause he said he was in the video dancing,
he could have been dancing with a pipe in his hand.
A pipe is a gun.
He could have danced with a pipe in his hand.
He could have been doing anything.
He just-- he just in there dancing.
And because--
[Billy] Is that still justified?
No, I ain't-- I ain't saying it was nothing--
I didn't say-- I'm not saying it justified,
That's why I was sitting in the middle.
But at the same time, you could feel in danger.
He could be on the phone.
You don't know who-- What-- what you gonna do?
Now, when they pull up on the side of that--
on the side of that bus,
'cause somebody got popped on the corner right here,
sitting on the bus.
[Billy] We're talking about making a moral decision.
Moral.
Because we're trying to reduce
gun violence in Chicago.
That's our main objective.
And in order to do that,
we got to stop justifying senseless behavior,
that amounts to people losing their life.
Now, it's a whole list of scenarios,
so if you ain't get to share,
I'mma jump to you on the next one.
"Your friend pushed
a 70 year old woman to the ground
and steals her purse."
- [chattering] - I know.
So we're all on the same side on this.
[Billy] You know, I read a thing and it says,
uh, in Chicago, there's no more
than about 2,500 to 3,000 people,
who are actually the perpetrators
and the victims of gun violence.
That's not a lot of people, right?
You mean to tell me we can't help 3,000 people?
One side or in the middle.
[Billy] Turn it around, show them something different?
[calm music plays]
[Marshall] As you can probably tell,
this was not a Baptist church all the time.
[chuckles] We acquired this space in 1993.
And we decided to kind of replace
some of the European representations
with more cultural representations.
Let me show you all a picture.
Our logo was the bottom of a slave ship.
I'll direct your attention to...
the Maafa remembrance window.
That image was produced by British abolitionists
to expose the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade.
We refer to that experience
as the Maafa, or the Great Disaster.
Just looking at that image,
it's hard to see what their experience was like.
You know, they tight packed as if they're sardines.
This helps you understand what it was really like.
And then, as you can see, there's this blank window.
This will be the Sankofa peace window.
Sankofa,it means
you cannot move forward until you first go back
and get the things that you have forgotten.
And so, it's about learning from the past
in order to construct a better future.
Every time I see your faces,
it reminds me of their faces.
Because somebody else has created conditions
that control your life.
Seemingly control your life.
If you're so focused on tragedies,
you kind of lose sight and the hope that's also present
That God lives in West Garfield Park.
A place that has the lowest life expectancy in the city,
but a place with tremendous promise,
if we invest in those who are most vulnerable.
Aight, let's stand up. Move these chairs out the way, man.
So we're building a team, right? We're building a brotherhood.
You got to be able to communicate,
depend on each other, all that.
So, the activity we're going to do now,
the goal is for us to keep the ball
from hitting the ground for 60 seconds.
Go.
[Billy] You can't hit it more than three times
and the guy next to you can't touch it.
12 seconds. New record.
Hold on. Let me-- What you got to say.
Ain't gonna be like my ball, I would have just stepped back.
Make it a little easier,
so we ain't fighting for the ball.
Y'all let's do this, man. This the time now.
[chattering and laughing]
One link, one chain.
You guys are going to be a part of that chain.
[all] We all depend on the MAAFA Redemption Project.
We recognize that we cannot redeem my friends, my community
without first redeeming myself.
[all] I am a man.
I pledge as a man, to be responsible to myself,
my family and my community.
Who is Mike? Big Mike, man!
- [chattering] - [Billy] Come up, Mike, man!
Don't rush me, man, I got this, I got this.
[all cheering]
You're breaking my heart doing this right now, bro.
Therefore, our wish is to invest in mind, body and spirit,
so that we may repair
and build our city one block at a time.
Yo. [knocks on door]
Meditation at 7:15.
[Marshall] Housing was critical to us.
You know, providing a stable environment,
a bed, a kitchen.
You know, building routine, and doing chores
and accountability.
[Shamont] No, boy, I'm busy. Making a movie.
I'm making a movie.
You can't threaten me and I'm making a movie.
I don't care.
[Shamont] See, look, they want me to get mad,
because they think I don't like sweeping.
But they don't know I love doing this.
It ain't nothing but a little sweep.
Make sure that the neighborhood is nice.
I don't like dirt anyway. How you doing?
See, the West Side ain't bad, man.
They were trying to make us seem bad.
They be lying on us.
You got people out here, tattoos on their face,
sweeping the ground.
Oh, yeah, we gonna have fun today, church.
We gonna make you mad today, church.
[Deacon] I don't need you to act up today.
I see you doing it again.
What you mean you see me doing it again?
- What's gonna happen? - You'll see.
- You threatening me? - Yeah.
For some people, whooping works with some people.
- That's true. - I whooped my son one time.
I told you, I whooped the older boy.
Younger boy was good.
He say, "It was big brother."
Him, he needs a good whooping.
What's a whoopin'?
This is just-- this is a metaphor.
So, don't call DCFS, okay?
He didn't actually whoop his kids.
He whooped them with his words.
Right, D?
- And a belt, too. - [all laughing]
[Deacon] I show him love.
Even though he does the things he do,
uh, I still love him,
I still-- uh,
I still take time out to deal with him,
when a lot of people have turned their back on him.
I don't think he'd be on--
I never knew my pops.
I found out who my pops was when I was 17 years old.
[Deacon] But his dad is not in his life.
He knows his father hangs out
on the street corner, up here about the church.
And so, a lot of times he just goes up there
that's to see if he could see his father.
- [man 2] Ready? Go. - [machine whirring]
Fire right up.
- You right handed, right? - Yeah.
[Deacon] I'm right handed.
Every young man wants his dad to be proud of him.
Well, I played sports when I was younger,
but my daddy never came to none of my games.
Uh, never gave me a pat on the back,
never, uh, gave me a hug.
My daddy didn't know how to love,
and I believe his daddy don't know how to love,
So, I give him that, because I know how I felt
when I didn't have it in my life.
- Carry your own tools, man. - [Shamont] Yeah, get my stuff.
[Shamont] My weed whacker.
Some people got hammers, saws.
[Deacon] Pickaxe and a weed whacker.
[Deacon] That's a weed whacker.
[Shamont] To whack somebody weed.
- [Deacon] Good job. - [Shamont] Thanks.
We understand the struggles
that each and every one of you guys are going through,
'cause some of us been through those same struggles.
We're a special type of breed of men.
Some of y'all, man, have been shot,
multiple times and survived that.
And you here.
We're a special group of people, man.
I've been through a lot,
I've been to prison twice,
I've been getting shot and all that.
I got shot a lot of times.
21.
I didn't walk for a year and a half.
Excuse my language,
but you can't do shit for yourself
without your feet,
You know what I'm saying?
So when I got them back, that was--
Ain't nothing feel as good as getting your feet back.
[Billy] Let's talk about your work history.
No work history? Okay.
So, you got two convictions.
I got armed robbery with a firearm.
- I got a UUW. - [Billy] A UUW?
Man, we just want you guys to achieve
as much success as possible.
You got the power to change your story,
to define your narrative, you know what I'm saying?
That's the block I grew up on right here, man.
All this right here,
At least 25 years.
At one point in time,
we would have walked down this block.
We would have seen this block lit up,
people sitting all on their porch.
But right now, though, it done changed, man.
It's got real--
real, real dangerous
in the present time, you know what I'm saying, so...
Yeah, you better be looking at every car that pass by.
Know what I am saying?
You got to be aware of your surroundings.
Anything that's going on around you,
you have to pay attention to.
How you feeling?
- Oh. - Look at Big Head.
[both laughing]
With all the bullshit I gotta deal on daily basis,
- she keep me level-headed. - Yes.
He crazy.
That's why I be wanting him in the house.
'Cause, um...
there be too much going on.
Most days, she a blessing.
Some days, she's more of a, like, a headache.
That's what come with relationships,
they're not always perfect all the time.
- You a headache. - Skrrt.
It's actually a lot of happy times
are going around here, man.
Wassup, boy?
Ay, call my phone. Let's call my phone.
Mind if I call you, uh, later?
Kids grow up, they have childhoods.
I had a childhood, you know what I'm saying?
But you just grow up fast in this environment,
that's it, that's all.
[calm music plays]
If God willing, I got...
a lot more time to go, so.
I hope I can make my mother proud,
Billy proud,
anybody that cares about me proud.
[kids chattering]
A field of dreams.
As a kid,
yeah, I saw myself playing shortstop
for the White Sox.
You know, that was a-- a dream,
but, you know, at a certain point, man,
baseball wasn't as important to me no more.
More so than, shit,
just making sure I ain't get my ass beat
going to school.
[anchor] Almost 70 killings this year
have been tied to gang violence in Chicago.
[reporter] Last month, parents took their children
out of school,
when rumors spread of an all-out gang war.
[woman] I mean, it's-- it's an everyday thing.
If you walk the streets, if you go to school,
if you go to church.
It's-- it's a gang thing.
A high school basketball star,
considered one of the top prospects in the nation,
died Wednesday of gunshot wounds.
Ben Wilson, the 6'8 forward--
[anchor 2] Fatally shot a block from his high school.
His family, his school, the city mourned his loss.
I don't see why anybody do that to Ben.
What was going on in their minds?
What would make them think about taking
the life of someone?
I was 16 years old, my cousin came home one day,
and she told me that some guy had took
$10 out of her purse
while she was at the store, up at Simeon High School.
And, uh, I decided to go get a gun,
and I was going to go get our money back.
As we was walking towards the store,
out of nowhere, I just get shoved from behind
by the biggest person I've ever seen in my life.
And he told me, "Man, fuck you."
Now what?
It was about to be physical.
And I'm saying, "I can't let this dude
put his hands on me.
And possibly take this gun from me."
He lunged towards me, and in my mind,
it was, like, do or die.
Man, the moment I pulled the trigger...
I had, at that moment, realized
that I had done something very wrong.
[crying]
I took away life.
That's something I got to live with.
[tense music playing]
[anchor 3] Charged in the shooting
are two neighborhood teenagers, reported gang members.
[anchor 4] Their attorney says there is no evidence
they were gang members.
[man 4] When anybody has a gun, you must assume
they're looking for somebody to destroy.
[host] Benji's Mother, Mary Wilson, is here.
If I could arrange for you to speak to the killers,
what would you say to them?
I think what I would say is just--
Let's just close our eyes
and just focus on the fact that there was a time,
when we were not even here in a body.
And now that we are here in a body,
we're here for a purpose.
And let's try to think about what that purpose might be.
[Billy] I always felt like the mistake that I had made,
wasn't going to be what defined me as a person.
I went away for 20 years
and I just finished out that bit, man.
I came home and I decided
I was going to go about every day
making up for what I did.
What up, what up, what up?
We talking about forgiveness.
How powerful forgiveness is.
Let me ask a question to everybody.
Who-- who all here believe they deserve to be forgiven?
Raise your hand.
So, there's some people in here
who don't think that they deserve to be forgiven?
You don't think that you deserve...
Why don't you think you deserve forgiveness, man?
You're a human being.
You got flaws, you got weaknesses,
we make mistakes.
It's a really touchy subject, because, like,
in certain situations and stuff, like,
I've been involved in, I can't take back.
I don't know if that person, people gonna forgive me.
You know what I'm saying?
They people could still be out
trying to want revenge anything.
Like me.
I look over my shoulder every day.
Every day. All of us do.
I know we all do.
We in a jungle every day when we leave here.
You know what I'm saying?
This is the only space
where everybody can probably be they self a little bit,
or, you know, let out certain stuff
they can't do around when they with their guys
or on a block, or something like that.
Ain't nobody out here trying to have no apology.
I won't get in nobody's business,
but everybody, my-- my-- my crime is for public record.
I served my time. Everybody know.
At some point in life, man,
we've all been caught up in a level of ignorance
that has caused us to make plenty of mistakes.
First, man, just know how to forgive yourself, man,
when-- Without people even seeking
forgiveness from you.
So that you could sleep at night.
I-- I know I got purpose or something.
It ain't just to be--
Just mess around in the streets.
But it's hard to leave it alone,
when there's always something pulling you back into it.
It's, like, what other way is there
but to protect myself?
Even though I don't want to do this,
but I'm forced to do this.
So, I don't know.
[man] Everybody sign in. Everybody sign in.
We're here to learn something, we have to be open-minded
'cause anybody that don't come here to better they self,
I think you're in the wrong room.
So, be silent for a few moments
and focus on your breathing.
[calm music playing]
[Shamont] So y'all, I don't got time for schoolwork.
'Cause that's part of your work, too.
[Shamont] So then, you gon' get mad.
- Your GED. - [Shamont] You gon' get mad.
No, we get mad when you don't get your GED.
[Shamont] That's crazy.
Come on, Pop, you late for your meeting.
[Deacon] I gotta make sure you stay.
I'm straight!
[Deacon] You more important than a meeting.
No, I am not more important than a meeting.
The meeting more important than me.
[Deacon] Sit down and do your stuff.
He now-- He feel he accomplished something.
- [woman] Makes sense. - Then we go to the next thing.
Okay, so, he's with me.
Whatever help you need, I'll give him.
So, if there's any questions, I am here to help.
[Shamont] Okay.
Uh.
[Shamont] 25. Failed that too.
Okay, that's okay.
Because you're-- you're not familiar with it
- and you can always go back. - My back hurt.
- [woman] Okay, so-- - My neck hurt.
[woman] You want something,
- you want a different chair? - My back hurt. My leg hurt.
Get the laptop, sit at the desk,
we got to make it work.
- Can't I leave, ay? - [woman] No, no.
[woman] Mr. Slaughter. Mr. Slaughter.
Shut the door, so you're not distracted.
I don't even wanna do this stuff, man.
Ain't no one like doing that school stuff, bro.
Being a waste.
Mr. Slaughter. If-- Is reading a challenge?
[Shamont] Everything is a challenge,
I don't like doing nothing, period.
All the time I could be in school,
I could be outside, making money.
[woman] We're just your scaffolding.
We're just here, because you sat down,
or you agreed to,
"This is what will make me happy."
And, so, in between you getting from here to happy,
is your diploma.
I'm just saying. I don't-- I don't know, man.
[woman] Just answer my-- Okay.
Listen, y'all just ain't get--
Y'all never know where I am coming from, bro.
[woman] Okay, tell me where you coming from.
I'm getting tired of being stuck in this room.
♪
What's happening, my nigga? How you be?
[Shamont] One thing I know about me,
I've been living my life on these streets,
ever since I was 13 years old, I'm 22 right now.
Somebody might look at life, like,
you gotta grow up and get you a job, a career,
get old, you retire.
All that sounds good, but at the same time,
in my mind,
it was always, "Boy,
you ain't going to be shit, but a drug dealer."
Or, "You ain't going to be shit but a killer, or a robber."
[Marshall] Man, you can't separate
how Shamont kind of views himself now
from just the constant negative messages
that the neighborhood tries to reinforce
about who he is as he's growing up.
In 2013, the city closed 50 schools.
Majority of them in Black and brown neighborhoods
on the South and West Side.
You know, when you observe this neighborhood
in relation to others,
it looks the way it does, not by accident.
[reporter] Chicago's South Side.
Line of demarcation between Black and white
runs along the railroad tracks.
[Marshall] Majority of communities
driving the violence are those same communities
that Black folk were pushed into after the Great Migration.
And I think that's the biggest barrier, man.
I think it's trying to climb out of that.
[politician] "Ayes" are 46 and "nays" are zero.
[politician 2] I move to reconsider the vote.
[politician] All those in favor say "aye."
Those opposed say no.
- [all] No. - [gavel bangs]
[Marshall] One of the major goals
of this project is to push the limits
of what you can do and who you can be.
[Marshall] What makes you think your vote doesn't matter?
I mean, that's part of the reason we're here, right?
To understand what our power is in relation to theirs.
And what we do about it
to make our neighborhood better.
And then you can become mayor if you want to.
You got charisma. You're intelligent.
What's preventing you from aspiring to be the mayor?
You have to act different.
You have to define yourself differently.
You have to dream differently.
[man] And I know how, um...
[Marshall] So that we create the next alderman.
We create the next mayor.
All of our young people deserve an opportunity
to be redeemed.
God says, you may have been rejected
by other people, but you're accepted by me.
You may have been denied by others,
but you're received by God.
You may be thrown away by others,
but you are claimed by God.
God says, "You are still mine."
Can I get a witness right there?
- Yes, Lord! Yes! - [applauding]
[sizzling]
[Hatch] I know your mama sent you out here
- [Deacon] She sent me out here - [Hatch] On this mission.
- [Deacon] She did. - Clarify your mission again.
My mission is to prevent you
from burning the chicken like you usually do.
- It all depends on - Pretty simple.
how sophisticated you believe your mother to be.
See, she could have told you that,
so that you could come out here and pick up the skill.
And not just sit in there, 'til I get done.
You have to just feel the spirit.
- Barbecuing is spiritual? - That's the African way.
So you got to cut-- cut the flame, see?
- Don't smoke it, dog. - Doc. We got to cut the fry.
You really don't know how to use this, do you?
You have to cut the air off and keep the flame low.
I understand.
Burn the chicken like you usually do.
That's actually called grilling.
[laughing]
What's up, boy? Still have your bag?
[laughing]
I'm out at my cousin's house for the 4th of July.
You know, family get-together.
To be honest, I'm not really relaxing right now.
These 4th of July holiday weekends,
you know, they--
they have been historically dangerous in Chicago.
So, just got my guys on my mind.
I'm thinking about 'em.
We in America, we Black.
Everything about this day
don't have nothing to do with you.
I'm saying, like, how do we feel the fact
that the Chicago Police Department
is deploying, what,
extra 1,000, 1,200 officers.
For what?
Them 1,200, let's see how many--
how many-- how many shootings
- and bodies happened, okay? - [man] Exactly.
Because the 1,200, they don't have nothing to do
with keeping you safe.
It got everything to do
with keeping you in your plantation.
- [fireworks exploding] - [brass music playing]
[anchor 1] The city of Chicago flooded the streets
with thousands of extra police officers
during the holiday weekend.
But they could not stop an eruption of gun violence
[anchor 2] 1,500 police officers worked overtime
to try to prevent and respond
to violent incidents in the city.
Six people were killed and at least 66 others wounded
over the long holiday weekend.
Four people got shot. One dead.
I got a text message saying that Isaiah Manny had got shot
on 44th and College Road.
You know, it's one thing
to be living your life in a certain way
and you put yourself in harm's way,
but it's different when you living,
doing everything right,
you obeying the law
and then some random stuff happen.
He was in a little corner store,
you know, coming out.
Somebody just started letting off shots.
You know, he had lost a lot of blood,
almost bled out.
You know, I just started praying for the little brother.
And I keep just thinking about Steven Ward behind this,
you know?
I've been shot multiple times.
The program started August 2nd,
and I got shot a couple of days later.
after the program started.
I was going to go do what I knew I had to do,
because somebody shot me.
So, I wanted to hurt somebody who hurt me.
But they be on us. Don't be late.
- [all chuckling] - Got you, don't be late.
So I go-- I'm like, "I'll just stay in the house,
'cause I know I got to get up tomorrow
and be on work on time."
So, this program...
[Billy] A little over two weeks later, man,
he was shot and killed.
And I knew he was changing his life,
because even his fiancée, she would call and say, man,
she's so glad that he found this program,
because all he does now is study his books.
You know, before then, Steve be all out in the streets.
[anchor 1] There's a troubling report out
about young Black men in Chicago.
This new report shows almost half of those men...
[anchor 2] 47% of the city's 20 to 24-year-old Black males
have been out of school and also out of work
in neighborhoods on Chicago's South and West Side.
♪
[Billy] See the construction workers?
You got people in our community
that's on these construction jobs
making all this money.
While, you got guys on the same block hanging out.
It just don't seem like it make any sense.
♪
So, what we're doing is taking properties
and rebuilding them.
- [drill whirring] - See that?
All you have to do to get it off.
[Billy] You know, you'll see those guys out there,
learning the trade.
The way you address smaller cavity here...
[Billy] And they gonna put their learning to use on site.
So, is each way as efficient,
or is one way more efficient than the other?
[Billy] They're going to be rehabbing properties,
they're going to be increasing the value of the community.
Big Mike, I want you to be the first mastic painter.
That's all it is, it's simple, man,
ain't nothing to it.
- Ooh. - [tradesman] Put it back.
[Big Mike] Hey, don't-- don't record that, man.
Wow.
[teacher] All right, so--
so tomorrow we're going to test on module one, guys.
Who did not take advantage of reading module one?
Did not take advantage of--
So, you didn't read it? At all?
I ain't never studied a day in my life.
Okay, we have six weeks to get through this whole book.
He said, "Read the whole chapter."
We don't even have time for that.
The-- the time of the day.
If you take an hour out your day,
you're still not going to be able to read
100 pages in three days.
- I think that's for everybody-- - No.
- [student] No? So, you ca-- - Yes, I can.
- [student] Uh, well-- - Yes, I can.
[student] Obviously, the majority can't,
because most people that sit in here
been out of school
almost five, six, seven, eight years.
So, your study habits are very slim to none.
So that's why a lot of people ain't ready,
especially younger cats.
[teacher] You read the 39 pages?
Yes, I read-- I could test on that right now.
[teacher] So, you can't read the rest of that?
I can read the rest of it,
but you want me to read 61 more pages
and remember everything in the page?
It gonna take some time and guidance.
[teacher] So, what have I been saying
since the get-go?
We don't have time.
We have six weeks to get through this whole book.
We don't have that luxury.
Open your books in section two.
Start off the reading, sir.
"Falls from elevated heights
account for about one third of all deaths
in the construction trade."
[keys jangling]
[Marshall grunts]
[Marshall] Hey.
She likes to think that it's our office,
but this is my office.
Yes, our office, 'cause we share everything.
But, both of these, if you take a step back,
are very indicative of Marshall and I
and our personalities.
- You see-- - [Marshall] Hers is bland.
- No. - [Marhsall] And mine--
Can you let me speak?
- Mine is creative. - [Marshall's wife] First of all,
Bogus.
There are business cards
inside of your degree.
You know, I have my degree
in an official Bowdoin Marquis frame.
- Although it is framed... - I know I gotta fix it.
- ...it is crooked. - You-- you see?
I feel-- Obviously,
not enough detail has gone into this.
Yo, we weren't so full of it. [laughs]
You want me to do the sauce, too?
- No. - You sure?
- Yes. - Because I can do it.
[Marshall] It's a Hatch recipe.
Throw a little pepper in there.
Moderate, not a lot. Moderate.
[Marshall's wife] That's red pepper, baby.
Uh, yeah, I know. That's moderate.
[Billy] This be my assignment, baby.
I'm not the cooker. She's the cook of the family.
But I gotta, you know, contribute, man.
I gotta, in order to stay in the house,
I gotta. [laughing]
She always laughs when I tell her this,
but I was like,
"You was kind of, like, my dream woman.
Like, I conjured you up 20 years ago
and didn't know you, but I knew of you."
- He told me-- - [Billy] One shot.
He told me he saw me in the car.
[Billy] I had to hit the brakes.
He said he was leaving, and he came back,
'cause he saw me pull up in the car.
And then when she got out,
I just knew right then and there,
I had to get her name and her phone number.
If I wouldn't have did it then,
I would have always been wondering,
"Man, what if?"
But I ain't got to ask "What if," you know?
I already know now. So, see?
[laughing]
Hey, 'Quita. Anybody ask, I'm Playboy, you Cardi B.
Hey, look, y'all, it's Cardi B.
- [siren blares] - [Shaquita] You're so funny.
Before I clear it out and make a scene.
Hey, everybody, look, there go Cardi B!
[muffled chatter]
Cardi B, what you doing in Chicago, huh?
My girl, Shaquita.
Mm, she a little decent little Black girl.
Go to school,
she go to church, got a decent job.
I know what to do.
Buy a whole bunch of cheetah pets.
Buy, like, 50 cheetah pets.
Dig a big, ol' hole in the yard.
[Shaquita] See, this why you can't be in that field.
A lot of people say
I don't even deserve to be with her.
"He got tattoos on his face, he sell drugs."
All the other stuff-- "He play with guns,
he ain't the kind of-- he ain't the kind of dude for you."
All I know is on the other side looking in, though.
She fell in love.
Maybe I fell in love, too. That's my baby.
Now, I have me a little Shamont.
I have me a little Shamont Slaughter
running around here in the church.
Yeah.
[calm jazz music playing]
How far you in?
I have to use the bathroom.
[teacher] Please focus on these sections.
That way everybody can pass these exams.
[man] It is hard, getting back in the swing
in the classroom setting.
So you have to have the desire to actually grow.
[teacher] So, it's five over two, right?
[student] Now, you cross cancel, make five,
one to five, one time five, one to ten twice.
[teacher] I'm going to put another one up here,
- if you can do it? - [student] Yeah.
You want me to step up and do it?
[teacher] Yeah.
♪
[Shamont] I want to be able to do everything
for my baby that my daddy wanna never did for me.
[siren blares]
[indistinct]
[girl exclaims]
[grunts]
What up, man? How was your weekend?
It was decent. I went to [indistinct] funeral.
Found myself a little bit too active.
What was going on with that?
My head weren't in the right place.
I-- I can't say--
Really-- Too much going-- Too much detail.
I just found myself falling back into the same shit.
If you find yourself
dealing with the loss of a friend,
then you feeling like, "Man, somebody need to pay for that."
When you-- when you feeling like that
and you know you in these places,
in-- in these spaces, in your mind,
man, call me, man.
You know, 'cause you can easily be pulled off into something
that you really shouldn't be a part of.
[Shamont] Since I joined the MAAFA,
I go to work and come home, and I can live comfortably.
At the same time though, there's people that don't like that.
They fucked up my face.
They fucked up my damn face the other day.
All this illegal fast shit on the block I live on.
Corey and Jeff fucked up my damn face
and they put fucking staples in my fucking head.
I never let nobody fuck up my face like that
and a part of me, I want to go back, go kill...
everybody.
[Deacon] Have you ever disciplined yourself?
Have you ever graduated college? Check yourself. Get right, man.
Sometimes you got to check yourself.
You don't need that. Check yourself, man.
[Marshall] In neighborhoods like this,
it's very quick to immediately go to "I kill you."
Because that's the ultimate threat.
And if you say you're going to kill me,
I don't know if you're gonna do it or not.
So, I can't leave my life in your hands.
I just take you out first.
[man] You Super Mario, bro? You get that shit?
[gunfire]
[Marshall] This is all around you.
It almost feels inescapable,
that this is your ultimate fate.
If you kill one of mine,
it's only right that I kill one of yours.
[Shamont] When I was a baby, everything was decent.
My momma got five kids, five boys.
We used to be sleeping on pallets and shit.
Like, real life-- don't I--
don't got a bed, but it's comfortable as hell
up on this floor with all these blankets,
with me and my brothers.
My little brother, Keno,
was nothing like me.
When I went to school, I got Fs and Ds.
Keno? Going to school, As.
I would say As and Bs. But he really got no Bs.
Man, shorty got As.
So, my little brother got killed.
That would really make me not give a fuck about nothing.
He got killed, got shot in the back of his head,
walking down the street.
A hole in the back of his head like this big.
Ever since that day, in my mind,
I was finna make everybody have a hole that big
in the back of their head.
I was gonna make everybody mama cry
the way my mama cried every day.
I want to make all their brothers think
the way I'm thinking right now,
since they did that to my baby brother.
The one I know that was righteous.
[Billy] You know, Isaiah,
he almost bled out on the operating table.
So we're glad to have him back.
After I got shot, now it's like,
"You play crazy and try disrespecting me,
I'mma just throw it your way.
[man] We got you, man.
Fella's tweaking, folks.
[Billy] But he's a young man who's still traumatized
by how and what happened to him.
I understand the feeling. I've had guns drawn on me.
Actually, somebody tried to shoot me in the head.
You tend to arm yourself if you feel like
the police can't keep you safe, right?
Maybe we focusing in the wrong area.
Where you're going to have
the majority of the problems going on--
[shots firing in distance]
I ain't got to tell you what that is, my brother.
[Joshua] That was a lot of shots.
Man, I ain't got to tell you what that was.
Wow.
[sirens wailing]
[Billy] The police's job is
to kind of, like, respond to crime.
There's really no plan in place to prevent crime.
[sirens wailing]
[Marshall] Chicago has addressed gun violence
the same way that the nation as a whole has.
We now spend almost five million dollars
on policing every day in Chicago.
And this figure doesn't even include the $700 million
in police misconduct settlements since 2011.
This is the perfect reason why I'm going to be
in the house tonight, on a Saturday night,
because they-- They're looking for usual suspect and
my profile fits right in line with that.
We, as taxpayers, have paid out so much money
that we should feel like, when we see the police,
we're protected instead of feeling like
our life is in jeopardy.
They shot him in his apartment, let him bleed out, you know?
He had just had his first son.
His-- his girl was pregnant with his second.
They need to know that if they do something like this,
there's gonna be consequences.
You know, you're gonna lose your fucking freedom.
[crowd chanting]
The whole damn system is guilty as hell.
[anchor] Four years after the shooting...
[anchor 2] The Van Dyke murder trial
is just hours away.
[anchor 3] The police officer who was charged
with first degree murder
of the 17-year-old Laquan McDonald.
We want to see Jason Van Dyke go down
for murdering Laquan McDonald.
[Marshall] Laquan McDonald was a 17-year-old kid.
Shot 16 times by a Chicago police officer.
He was our Michael Brown.
He was our Treyvon Martin and so many others.
[anchor 1] It's the first time in decades
a Chicago police officer has been charged
with murder in an on-duty shooting.
[anchor 2] Jason Van Dyke took to the stand
to testify in his own defense.
His eyes were just bugging out of his head.
He had just these huge...
wide eyes just staring right through me.
[Marshall] Fact is that a lot of the folks
that knew Laquan before he was killed...
uh, the constant theme that they would use
to kind of describe him, a characteristic,
is that he was just very jovial.
He was playful, you know, he cracked a lot of jokes.
That's Shamont.
And apparently,
the other officers just saw a kid
Who obviously needed attention.
They cared.
But Jason Van Dyke saw a nigger...
that was worthy of death.
Yeah.
[woman] Your stories are the stories
we don't tend to hear.
So one of the things that I think about is,
yes, you're writing a book, yes, to publish your story,
but to use that story in a way
that's powerful to create changes,
not only in yourselves and amongst us, but beyond that.
You guys know that the Chicago Police Department
is mandated to have training.
So, where does the content come
to train those officers around that?
How do we teach them?
We're going to be meeting every Wednesday.
We're going to put together a collection of stories
that are unbelievably powerful,
and we're going to present your work,
printed and published.
[Zay] But law enforcement?
The reality is, even when we do share
these stories with them, there's still gonna be
unarmed, Black, innocent people getting killed.
You know what I'm sayin'?
There still gonna be people our age
or older who's traumatized
by certain events, because of police officers.
That's what makes the world flow.
Violence will always make the world flow.
It's a part of life, period.
[Johnny] I just think it's important
for us to have our voice out there,
sharing those difficult stories,
those stories that you just really don't want to share.
Because oftentimes, we think we going through
this shit by ourselves, but there's somebody else
that's going through the exact same thing.
Leave your comfort zone, right?
[Zay] It ain't really comfort.
It just triggers, like, certain things in my head.
So now, I'll give you an example, like...
everybody know got shot.
You know, talking about only, like, really--
talking about specifically that day,
or whatever the case is,
'cause I still-- You know what I'm saying?
I still battle with this shit.
I still visualize everything.
From gettin' shot to the emergency room
gettin' out the emergency room to recovering.
You know what I'm saying? So--
[Johnny] No, I-- Trust me.
So, I was shot almost 30 years ago, right?
Like-- like, messed up.
Came out the hospital in a wheelchair,
the whole nine, right?
I couldn't walk.
So-- And I still, to this day, just a-- You just--
The minute you mentioned that,
I went back to the day I got shot.
And I'm going to be honest with you,
it's not gonna go away, but every time we meet,
you're going to grow a little bit.
- Trust me. - Well, I don't trust people.
So, I ain't talking to nobody, man.
I just can't do it.
[Billy] I'm looking at these faces, man.
It's going to be a lot of you brothers, man,
that I know, before this is all over,
we're going to love, like our own family.
It's unfortunate that we have imprisoned
our own self and our own community.
I'm not talking about not traveling out of Illinois,
some of y'all don't even travel four blocks away
from where you live.
Am I lying?
Because, you know, that's a danger zone.
Some of y'all ain't even went downtown
and took a walk on the Riverwalk.
Because you don't feel safe
outside of these silos that you can build for yourself
within your own communities.
We're going to change that.
[Marshall] Ay, y'all, hey, repeat after me, "This trip."
[all] This trip.
"Is a church trip."
- [all] Is a church trip. - [man] Aw, no, that's a setup.
- "This trip." - [all] This trip.
- "Is a church trip." - [all] Is a church trip.
- [Marshall laughing] Okay? - I better get off two blocks.
[Marshall] Let everything follow from that, all right?
["The Wonder Years" by The O'’My'’s playing]
♪ When I was a snot-nose, my Papa told me ♪
♪ All you got is family, son, soon you'’ll see... ♪
[Marshall] I know for me just how crucial it was
to experience the world outside of Chicago.
The purpose of the trip is to share with one another,
to grow closer,
just to really expand their world view.
♪ Somebody put you down, better stand up ♪
[indistinct lyrics]
[indistinct shouting]
Yeah! You better know your rights!
♪ Sell CDs in packs of five ♪
♪ Better rap your heart out ♪
We ain't got to worry about nobody shootin' at us,
no police messing with us.
We ain't got to worry about shit.
I want to be like that for the rest of my life.
♪ Papa told me ♪
- [chatter] - [music fades]
[Shamont] You know how much I love you?
[Shaquita] I love you, too.
Yo mama mad because I popped two off.
You haven't had [indistinct] in a month.
She blue.
Don't nobody want their daughter have a baby by me.
- That's crazy. - [Shaquita] Yeah.
I'mma call you back I finna hop in the shower.
[both] I love you.
[Shaquita] No, I love you more.
Ma, I love you more.
[Shaquita] Nope. That's impossible.
How is that impossible?
[Shaquita] 'Cause I love you more.
Aight, bet. Nah, but I love you more.
[Shaquita] No, you know--
Aight, bet. I finna go.
- [Shaquita] Bye. - [Shamont] Bye, babe.
[calm music plays]
[guide] In a moment, we're going to be walking
into the Senate chamber that was in use
from 1810 to 1869.
That was a period that was known as the golden age...
[guide] That's a nickname that needs to be taken
- with a grain of salt, - For free.
[guide] because that was the nickname they gave themselves.
[Marshall] The first question that we pose
to the guys is, "Who are you?
How do you see yourself?"
If you don't know and if you don't appreciate
your history,
if you don't really love the people
who loved you into existence, your ancestors,
if we don't cherish that legacy,
we don't know who we are.
[man] We are at Howard right now,
we are on Howard campus right now.
[Deacon] Howard is a premier historically Black university.
And so I want them to step on campus,
breathe in that history,
and they kind of see themselves as part of it.
[man] Ay, we heard about you.
[woman] Basically, what this house is,
is not only our English department,
but our Department of Foreign Languages.
So when you come in as a freshman,
you work directly with Fortune 500 companies
such as Johnson & Johnson, JPMorgan,
- things like that. - [man] I'll get money, money.
Don't trip. Y'all will see me again.
[woman laughs]
[woman] All right, any questions about preemptive or anything?
No?
[woman on TV] The future of Howard University
promises to be amazing.
[Marshall] With Shamont,
there's this inbuilt frustration
with education.
[woman on TV] Howard has delivered
a myriad of writers, filmmakers...
[Marshall] But at the same time, his potential is immeasurable.
We just got to keep-- keep challenging him to grow.
Our department is one of the departments
that makes major contributions,
uh, to American society.
[overlapping chatter]
Shamont, let's go!
Yo, leave me alone, bro.
[Shamont] Bro, leave me alone.
[man] We guests, Shamont, we ain't in Chicago.
[Shamont shouting] That's how they talk, huh? Come on, boo!
[man] We ain't in Chicago, bro.
[Shamont] I don't give no fuck. Damn!
I don't even wanna be with y'all ass, bro.
[man] Sal, we goin' down.
[Marshall] Maybe the purpose of this trip is to convince you
that you belong at a place like Howard,
or Georgetown, or anywhere.
You belong there.
The biggest obstacle is for you to see that.
[Billy] Hello.
Yeah, I had to go to court for Lul Charles.
Last night,
Lul Charles, man, was arrested for a gun.
I hate this place.
He ran from the police, allegedly.
And they recovered a gun, allegedly.
So, he could get 6 to 30 years.
[somber music playing]
[Lul Charles] Not going to go into detail,
but you didn't think
a program is going to just solve everybody's problem?
It's not going to happen.
You slip and you fall,
and this is the only thing that you get.
The jail and the prison system.
That's extremely frustrating.
It's not making anybody better or anything like that.
[Marshall] I think what I'm trying to say is,
our goal is to always keep
- pushing you. - [man] Why?
Your relationship with us is about
us having high expectations for you
and trying to hold you accountable to that.
Right? So, I know you want to go to school
so, the focus should be there every day.
Be working towards something.
The portion that we're working on now,
is for the English part, right?
It says, "A trip to the ocean can be a relaxing escape
from the everyday pressures of life."
Hey, are you staying up too late?
Man, I'll be honest, bro, I'll be waking up at night
- at all kinds of hours. - Why?
I don't know. I have nightmares.
You have nightmares?
I be dreaming about my little brother,
so I be tweaking and I'll stay up.
[teacher] Do we need to get you some help?
Nah, boy. [laughs]
[laughs] Whatever you gave--
[teacher] Boy? Do I look like a boy?
Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.
- They try and lock me up though. - [teacher] No!
No, no, no, Shamont, excuse me,
you may need to talk it out.
I mean, we haven't dealt with it effectively,
is what I'm saying.
Because you have not had any counseling for you,
you did not have any grief counseling or anything.
[Shamont] I don't think we need counseling,
we're from the hood.
No, see that's mis-- that's a misconception.
We need what everybody else needs.
We are humans just like everybody else.
And you know why we-- And this is why we continue
to down spiral,
because we think we don't need it,
but we need it.
[Johnny] The thing is, you have to be able to open up
and say, "Man, this is what I'm going through."
And I know it's weighing on you.
You know what I'm saying?
It's pressure, this shit'd weigh on anybody.
How long y'all been doing this?
- It's a Whole year. - A whole year.
You've been shot, you had all kind of shit happening.
You still here, so that means you want to do something.
The thing is, man, you just got to
put in the energy, man.
And the fact is, you come here every day
to your meeting.
You want something else.
Now it's about, like-- like, what you want to do
to do something else.
[Zay] Sometimes, I can't even sleep,
I wake up with cold sweats.
With this trauma and PTSD, you know, like,
because there's a lot of people that got PTSD, honestly.
And they're, like, kind of in denial.
Some people are in denial, some people are not, so.
What some people don't realize, like, they really gotta,
like, the fact, like, you feel like you got to carry
a gun everywhere you go.
That's PTSD.
I mean, honestly? Yeah.
I used to lie to myself to say I wasn't,
because I didn't really, like, fully understood, like...
that how could, like, really-- How it really affect me.
But, like, over time, it's starting to get to you.
[Johnny] If it's a specific moment,
how did that moment affect you in some way?
[Zay] You keep it all bottled in.
You don't really talk to nobody.
Either you're gonna be able to tame it, like,
keep it tame as much as possible,
or eventually, it's just gonna spill out and just...
cause it just to overload.
[man] They say everything comes in twos.
So, we got two announcements.
I just came to find out yesterday,
my baby mama is six weeks pregnant.
[all cheering]
[Marshall] My baby mama is eight weeks.
[all laughing and cheering]
[man] So we got, like, three babies.
[Marshall] My alpha baby.
[man] It's so, it's so crazy.
[laughter]
[Shaquita] No. Ugh, okay.
[Shamont] Babe, let me see your face.
It's why I had to call you.
[Shamont] I thought you said that I ain't never--
[Shamont] I thought you said it weren't for real.
[Shamont] I was asleep, she called me one morning,
she said she needed to go to the hospital.
I asked her, "Why? What happened?"
She said she has a whole bunch of blood
and she dying or whatever.
She said she thinks she having a miscarriage.
I was saving up for my baby. When I found out
she had a miscarriage, that shit was over.
I started getting high, I started spending that shit,
I started doing all kinds of shit.
I was saving that money for a reason, for a baby.
You know, a baby is what I was fucking saving that shit for.
Fuck that money.
[Deacon] Slaughter does not do what he needs to do.
And he fell back doing his GED.
And so, it was real hard trying to find out
what he's thinking, to try to help him.
[Deacon] Slaughter!
- Did you eat something? - [Shamont] No.
- You got some money? - [Shamont] No.
I just gave her some money to go get him something to eat.
You gave him some money for what?
'Cause he did all that work in there.
[Shamont] Man, I could've did that.
- That's what I'm talking about. - [Deacon] Did you see?
You ain't never said "Come over there and do no work."
You know what I'm sayin'? How do you expect me to come--
- Cause that's stupid. - [Deacon] You playing games.
You ain't said nothin' about work--
Hold up, hold up.
Did I tell you to come over at ten o'clock?
- [Shamont sighs] - Yes or no?
- [Shamont] That don't got-- - [Deacon] Answer the question.
- [Shamont mumbling] - Did you come at ten o'clock?
- Yeah, man, nah-- - Did you come at ten o'clock?
- No, I didn't. - [Deacon] Okay then.
Ya'll ain't gotta record everything.
- [Deacon] Yeah, yeah. - Get the fucking camera
out of my face.
[phone ringing]
[Lul Charles] Hello?
No, ma'am.
This is what confines me.
It's a house arrest box.
Pretty much, it's just a home-monitoring center.
[Joshua] So you can't leave the house and you can't go
- back to the program. - [Lul Charles] Yeah.
You know, the system is broken.
So, they're gonna do what they want to do
when they feel like doing it.
It's just the system.
Set up for failure,
which is what they want you to do,
at the end of the day.
[Billy] We gotta get you up out of here, man.
I'm gonna talk to Bilal tomorrow
and see how soon we can get you over there.
I need you to lay low, bro, until you hear from me.
Yeah, I ain't got no problem doing that.
I just need some time to chill
with my family for the holidays, though.
[Billy] Yeah, do that. Do that.
But I need you to chill in the house.
- All right? - Yeah.
All right, boy. I love you too.
[door creaks shut]
When I was growing up,
I could not come over here on this block.
My grandparents and mother moved over
in this neighborhood when I was a baby.
Ashland was the divide block.
Black people couldn't really go across Ash.
Now Ashland is still the dividing line itself,
but it's not dividing Blacks and whites.
It's dividing clicks against clicks.
So, I was cool over here.
This was the block I grew up at.
My son grew up in that house right there.
With the fifth house off the corner.
[somber music plays]
When my son was born, I was in prison.
So, it was almost like a dream.
And at that moment,
everything about this person is perfect.
And you want to help that perfection
last as long as possible.
It was like, "Man, I gotta get out to be with my son."
And the day that I walked out, oh, man, it was a happy moment.
Finally, I got an opportunity
to be the best father that I could be.
But, you know,
me and his mother weren't together.
And I think he had a level of resentment
that he had to be brought up
without me in his life every day.
So, a lot of times when I spoke,
what he probably heard was static.
You see that red car right there?
That red car right on the corner?
That's exactly what my son was parked
when he got killed there.
He got killed right there on that spot.
♪
You know, at a certain age,
it's hard to change this way of life.
[Shamont] In my room, dirty boy.
Oh, shit. Gone, man.
I got weed right here, and they're gone.
Gone, man.
[Joshua] Tell me what's been going on lately.
Nothing.
- [Joshua] How's the GED going? - I ain't getting that shit.
That's what I need to do.
We probably need to act on that fast.
[woman] Yeah, I was just thinking.
[Shamont] Man, we on that blood, though.
Don't try, might find a motherfucking pill.
There, that's tweaking.
♪
[Marshall] Man, he's experienced a lot of pain.
But he can't keep running from himself.
And I told him this to his face.
If you're not going to stop the pill popping, the drugs,
then we're not gonna be able to help you anyway.
[Joshua] So, what are you planning to do?
Man, I'm gonna just go to sleep.
When I wake up, I'm leaving.
I wake up when I'm finna go.
No, I ain't tryin' to stay here.
That what they want me to do, stay here.
[Shamont mumbles]
[funder] So, we really want to
kind of talk about two criteria.
Obviously, our grant is designed to fund the most at-risk men.
So we do need, you know, just confirmation
that the guys who are in there meet that criteria.
[Billy] Oh.
[funder] Wondered if you all were serving
the same population of highest risk.
- [funder 2] Okay, sounds good. - All right. Thanks, gentlemen.
Appreciate you, God bless you.
- [funder 2] Thanks, everybody. - [Marshall] All right.
The funniest-- The funniest comment was,
"Well, we know that some are high risk,
but we want the highest risk."
What does that-- what does that mean?
That's everybody the hell over here.
This the funding war.
That's why nothing ever changes, you know?
They want to go with that dog and pony show.
They could just leave me the hell out of it,
'cause I don't care, you know?
I really don't care
to be in no competition for no blood money.
[Marshall] I mean, there's a lot of
social service organizations
that have been starving for a long time,
fighting for the same crumbs.
It's like putting a band-aid on a bullet wound.
[man on phone] Uh, did you get a chance
to show Jessica the budget?
I know she was waiting on.
[Marshall] Because what ultimately needs to change
are the conditions that produce shooters
in the first place.
[man] Yeah, you already know, man.
Most of you guys know my own son was murdered.
I don't know if the guy who murdered my son
is sitting in this room right now.
You know what I'm saying?
But he could be.
So, if I couldn't extend forgiveness
to that young man who killed my son,
there's no way I could sit up here and work
with any one of you guys who I know may be guilty
of the same type of crime
that I myself was guilty of.
I can't stand in front of you guys
and say that I want better for you,
if the guy who killed my son
walked in here and the only thing
I could think about is killing him.
[Johnny] Thinking about forgiveness,
let's write based on what was--
Uh, what this helps pull up out of you.
Do some writing right now,
while we're having fresh thoughts.
Go ahead, you know what I'm sayin'?
See, I'm not finna forgive the person that shot me.
Not right now. Hell no.
I got some real anger in me built up.
But I want to apologize to my people, though.
How can I want-- You know what I'm saying,
apology and sympathy from them,
if I'm not even giving the motherfucker
who did something to me no type of sympathy or remorse.
Yeah, that's a hard thing,
to-- to embrace, you know.
But if you-- if you're not willing to forgive,
guess what?
Never expect forgiveness to ever come your way.
I sat across the table
from Benji's two younger brothers,
and they expressed the years of hatred they had for me.
But, the hate that they had in their heart didn't kill me.
It was killing them.
You will have to let it go, man.
Because if you're not willing to get past it,
it's gonna kill you more than it's going to hurt
the other person who you holding it against.
[Johnny] Let's take the time to write.
- [Billy] Did you talk to him? - No.
Well, you need to.
[Marshall] You know, in our work
of course you have thoughts of doubt...
about what impact our programs have.
With Shamont,
doubt says that nothing mattered,
didn't have any impact, any effect, positively on his life.
Faith says maybe a seed was planted in his soul.
And that just because we can't see it now,
doesn't mean that it's not there.
[all shouting faintly]
[Deacon] The overall goal is to reduce gun violence, right?
But at the same time, when you get to know guys
and you get to know their habits,
or their deficiencies,
then you got to start looking at success
in a different way.
[woman] It's incredibly brave and challenging.
The thing about writing memoirs is
it takes us back to that moment.
And it can be some of the most challenging,
heart-wrenching experience,
is to feel that again.
Some authors had many,
many pieces to choose from, let me tell you.
I'm going to shout out Zay for a second.
Zey's a prolific writer.
He had a lot of different pieces to choose from.
[Johnny] I think Zay should lead off, that's our little brother.
If Zay chooses to.
It's your choice, Zay.
Uh, the piece is called "No Guidance No More."
"I could talk about all the shit I lost in the streets.
I lost opportunities. I lost homes.
But the main thing I lost was my father.
No, not my actual father.
That nigga around this earth somewhere.
My fucking grandfather, man.
My main guy.
Partner in crime, father figure.
I lost a nigga who I view as my protector, my king.
And I was his prince.
I hate it because
he's the only one I allow to call me and shit."
[voice cracking] I can't read that shit, bro.
[woman] It's up to you, love.
You don't have to continue. It's okay.
[somber music playing]
[Zay] Oh, man. [mumbles]
You got something else I can carry?
- [Deacon] That's it? - Yeah.
[Deacon] We told him to call us when he's ready to come back.
So, sometimes, you got to let them see,
uh, that the choice that they make
is not-- is not good for them.
[Marshall] You got to take responsibility
for your own life, your own actions.
There comes to a point, you can't blame nobody else.
And that's what it means by he came to his senses.
He said, "I got myself here in this pig sty.
Therefore, I need to get myself out of it."
So, the son is coming back to the estate,
thinking, you know,
"My father will probably be disappointed."
[Shamont] Which he probably was.
[Marshall] Which he probably was,
but he didn't show it, the father ran,
hugged him, embraced him.
To the father, the apology is not even important.
What's most important is that you are here.
You came back.
[Deacon] Home sweet home.
You got a bathroom right there.
You can put your TV up here.
[Shamont] In the corner right there?
[Deacon] Uh-huh. There's a socket right there.
You got your Bible?
Yeah, you got your bathroom, right?
This what I got back when I was here.
[Shamont] I feel like I got to grow up
and stop acting like a little kid.
[Deacon] Your own bathroom.
[Shamont] I can't afford to go to jail and none of that.
And I'll be damned if I go down like that.
And I got everything that's going on right now.
Nuh-uh.
Yeah! Welcome back.
[Deacon] I'm glad to see you back in the space, bro.
I had to get back in the swing. Getting up early, man.
[Deacon] Lul Charles is back in space. [laughs]
[Lul Charles] Kind of funny that a 23-year-old can be considered
an armed habitual criminal, which is a career criminal.
Judge actually, uh,
said I was a danger to society.
And everybody, uh, touched a few nerves,
because when you working to change yourself,
if somebody tries to label you,
it's really tough, because I know
I'm meant for something bigger than a jail cell,
a prison cell.
That ain't me.
[Deacon] It's coming over to you, Lul Charles.
Get up under there.
[drill whirring]
[Billy] They said, today is a record number
of young people voting.
So I told him, he wants to be a part of history, right?
Mission accomplished.
That's crazy.
- I was trying my best. - [Billy] I see that.
[Marshall] No social program,
no program like this,
can really save anybody.
[laughing] You-- you voted.
[Billy] Be a good man, Slaughter.
[man on phone] That's good, Slaughter.
[Marshall] When it comes to actual healing or redemption...
Hey, gentlemen, break over in five minutes.
[Marshall] ...that can only come from...
Where are you going? Check in in a minute.
[Marshall] ...relationships.
And the investment in relationships.
I might not be around,
'cause I'm doing my homework and shit.
You gotta stay in school, y'all. You gotta do something.
You gotta stay-- You gotta get this focused now.
Fuck that weed, fuck them pills.
We got to get this focused, so you can get yourself focused.
Hell yeah, I smoke.
What are you talkin' about? That's how I stimulate my mind.
Hell yeah, I get high, but I stimulate my mind
another way, too.
[crosstalk]
[Billy] I learned a long time ago,
you don't stop talking to people
because it appears as if they're not listening.
[man] Stop shooting with your eyes closed.
[Billy] If you're talking to them,
out of love and concern,
you never know what they're picking up on.
Shoot, shoot!
As long as you're showing up every day...
There you go.
What you waitin' on now, Zay? Shoot that.
I'mma be in your face,
I'mma be your hair, I'mma be in your ear...
Isaiah! Isaiah!
...telling you to write shit.
I'm gonna take responsibility for that shit I've done here.
I want to give an apology to my mother,
my brother, and my sister.
I put them through more than...
I wanna say more than they can bear.
How are y'all doing this evening?
[man] Good.
Y'all have to bear with me, I ain't never done this before.
The first thing I want to do is
I want to thank Billy Moore, man.
He saved my life, man.
- Saved my life. - [all cheering and applauding]
[Zay] He left me to basically
figure everything out and in the process,
I done caused a lot of damage.
Damage that didn't need to be done.
"To change anything, you must first reflect.
I don't blame anyone for my shortcomings,
not even my parents.
Even as a young man, I was supposed
to make adult decisions.
It helped me mature,
but it also caused me great heartache.
The path I chose, I don't regret it.
It made me stronger and more resilient.
My past did not define my future.
Because I've been to prison shouldn't hinder me
from being successful.
With that being said,
I celebrate myself as just that, a man.
A young Black man with great potential."
[woman] That's right.
[Marshall] This year marks the 400th anniversary
of the first enslaved Africans being brought
to the so-called New World at the bottom of slave ships.
We declare that this is the year of Sankofa.
[cheering and applause]
I thank God that he's allowed us
to install this beautiful piece of art.
But of course, it's more than a stained glass window.
It's a memorial meant to shape how
and why we remember the names and the stories.
[Billy] I met Steven Ward
two weeks after my son had got killed.
I think one of the ways that I was able to honor my son
is to be there for a young man like Stephen Ward
and provide an opportunity to give him a space to change.
[woman] Shamont Slaughter.
[cheering and applause]
[Billy] This is evidence
of what we can do with young men,
who's trying to change their lives
and refuse to give in
to the narrative that they're not redeemable.
As a father who wanted the best for his son,
I want the best for each and every last one of these guys
that come through the program.
You know, they got this picture made
of me and my son, and everybody signed it.
And they basically talked about how
I lost a son but, uh, you know,
through all these young men that I worked with,
I inherited all these other sons,
you know?
[Marshall] And the reality is,
that all of us have Sankofa stories.
[people shouting] Yeah!
Let our stories be connected to the pain
- and the glory... - [people shouting] Yeah!
...of this great cloud of witnesses. [sobs]
- [cheers and applause] - [sobbing continues]
Where he is now, it just shows how much more we have to do.
And he has to do so much more.
Growing and maturing.
[woman] A baby bather.
[Shamont] What is this?
[laughter]
You put 'em in a tub and wash 'em up in it?
[women] Yeah!
It's becoming real to him, man.
[Shamont] I like to thank everybody.
Like always, every time I ask, I actually do get nervous,
someone always come through.
Y'all are the best, man. Y'all know y'all is.
- And now y'all can have my son. - [laughter]
Yeah, that's the plan.
Y'all need to get him scraped.
Like y'all got me scraped.
Thank everybody in MAAFA.
[Marshall] Success in this line of work,
Maybe you don't see it in six months or nine months
or even six years.
And so, the doubt is trying to convince me that
the structural inequalities are too intractable.
The self-destructive habits that exist are too rooted.
But the forces of oppression are unrelenting.
And so the opposite force
really has to be greater.
Each generation has to continue fighting
if you want to do anything meaningful
in the time that you're allotted to live.
[woman laughing]
And the world that these young men are creating
is the world that my children
and their children will have to grow up in.
[atmospheric music playing]
♪