YOUTHS, from page 5
2 h ™
t ’ i7ait’ S° you cross t t e street,
h v , P? n g0ing’ and then you
crossed back later? Was that really
necessary? Was the view really that much
mcer over there? Fm notWfl/ h^ ”
stereotype ‘we can’t trust you, because
you re wearing baggy clothes'’ or
something.
Q: How does that make you feel?
Hartley: It enrages me.
. McC^ Basically I feel like even if I’m
m a professional outfit, that still doesn’t
change my skin color. People are still going
to look at me like I’m a black guy.
Hartley: I think it depends on the
generation, too, that that’s a fact. I was
working smce I was a freshman in high
school - because it was a must, is a must -
and I m coming from home, 99th and
Gateway, the Chase Bank, cashing my
check, worked 80 hours plus. I’m about to
miss my Max on my way to work. I’m
slightly dressed up - it was Friday; it was
casual I had on regular slacks, dress shoes
and a dress shirt. I started jogging for my
Max, and ah of a sudden, a couple women
look at me and just clutch their purses. I
wanted to stop and be like, “I don’t need
your money.” I was about to be late for
work, but it’s like, “You guys are a waste of
time. You really just tried to clutch your
purse like I was going to run up and grab
it? Look^at how I’m dressed. Do you really
think I need that from you?” That’s just a
consistent thing, like you’ll get on a bus and
sit somewhere and someone will get up and
move. It doesn’t bother me. I’m an introvert
anyway. I don’t want to be around you, you
know, but it’s the thought of it happening to'
other people that may care. It makes me
pissed off.
McCall: Or going into a restaurant I’ve
been in multiple restaurants where I’m
walking in by myself and there’s all white
people sitting down having dinner, but I
walk in and all the heads turn toward me
like I’m not supposed to be here, but I’m
just ordering my food.
Q: Is there anything you’d like to tell white
Portland?
Hartley: If the motto is “Keep Portland
Weird,” then how come when you see .
someone different from you, you assume
something bad, or you don’t like it? If
Portland is supposed to be weird, than
everything should be accepted, not looked
down upon or treated a certain way.
Because everything applies to weird, so
weird is normal in Portland. Why does
Portland portray something it doesn’t truly
believe?
Black: We need to be consistent with our
morals. At one time we push for a black man
to be able to marry a white woman, but then
when it’s two men - there’s a pause. We say
people need all these civil liberties: I can’t
just kill you, I can’t just search you, I can’t
make you work for free, but as soon as one
of you guys gets incarcerated? Death
penalty; I can make you work for slave
wages. We’re not really consistent. Why is it
Stephan H artly shares what he learned from l e a d ^ ^ s ^ a b ^ t
graduates Malik Farrakhan and Joshua Davis.
OK when you’re a prisoner? And
yeah, it s black people now, but it
could totally flip, and now white
people are incarcerated, and
Youth Experience graduation in September by fellow
police, in some capacity, be there
interacting with the kids, building
those relationships at early stages,
because I know as a young black
go/ng th ro ugh th e sam e
thing, and they’ll be like, “This is**“
unjust” We’re still human.
Davis: One thing I’ve noticed
with a lot of my friends, is like,
something I try to tell people is:
Don’t ignore it just because it
doesn’t apply. Because if it’s
someone being treated wrongly,
it does apply to you. I can’t
remember if it Was Martin
Luther King who said, “Injustice
anywhere is a threat to justice
everywhere.” So if it’s affecting
someone else, it’s going to come
around and affect you. It might
be blacks one day, but. soon, it
might be everybody.
6QUITY AND
"E v e n I f I'm
in a p ro
fe s s io n a l
o u tfit, th a t
s t ill d o e sn 't
change m y
s k in color«
P e o p le are
s t ill g o in g to
lo o k a t m e
lik e F m a
b la c k g u y /'
m a le , I w a s ta u g h t n o t to tr u s t th e
* police, never to talk to the police;
police are bad. I feel like the
crime would go down if police are
interacting and building these
relationships at young ages
instead of just always being found
in our communities when they’re
looking for problems that they
believe we are causing.
Davis: This is kind of broad.
I’m still thinking about it. But we
talk about wanting everybody to
be treated the same, or treated
with equity. Have that be a start
If you want everyone to be the
samé and have the same
opportunities, treat them the
same. Give them the same
Q: What should we do about the
opportunities, but don’t assume
WiLANORAE they can’t take the same
issues facing young black men in
MCCALL,
Portland?
18 challenges. If you grow up feeling
like you’re different, that’s what
McCall: What I think is youth
you’re going to act like. Everybody
intervention program. Different from a
wants to think they control themselves, but
mentor program - having someone older
pretty much what people tell you you are, if
come talk to you about how you should be
you hear it enough, you believe it. We hear
better in life - but hearing from somebody
people Say we’re at risk; we start to believe
you know, that you’ve seen grow up with
it.
you. It’s a different perspective.
“We’regoing to dream a little,”Murphy
Hartley: I was a part of the Community
said. He asked the young men to envision a
Centers Initiative here in Portland, and we
world where the statistics he listed at the
basically made it free at two different
beginning of the discussion didn’t exist.
community centers in East Portland and in
“Describe what that might look like. ”
Northeast Portland for low-income families
to have the availability to put their children
Hartley: That is pretty hard to envision
in the programs. What I tried to do with the
for me because of everything I’ve been
children that were there, because we had
through. But I guess if it ever did happen, I
over 1,300 kids just sign up at one
would see less African-Americans having
community center, which pushed us to open
depression problems because they don’t
another community center free, is have the
know how to identify themselves. I would
I Im ow as a
felaclc
stale? I was
ta u g h t n o t
to tru s t the
police? never
to talfe to the
p o lic e ; p o lic e
are h a d , | fe e l
lik e the c rim e
w e a ld g o d a m
I f p o lic e a re
in te ra c tin g and
h a ild ia g these
re la tio n s h ip s
a t y o n n g ages
in ste a d o f fa s t
alw ays b e in g
fo u n d in o a r
eom aiasixties
w hen th e y 're
lo o k in g lo r
p ro b le m s th a t
th e y b e lie ve we
a re c a u s in g /'
STERMHt HARTLEY.
see the whole racial aspect of any type
of application taken away. I would see more
black males actually taking care of their
families and, you know, in th e family instead
o f o u t s o m e w h e r e , j u s t le a v in g t h e m o t h e r
to fend for the family. I'm-going to-leave it
at that because I can’t really see th at
Black: (Wesley began by describing a
scenario where someone he knew reached
out to him and others in his circle of friends
to say goodbye because he believed
someone was coming to visit him in a
violent manner. Wesley and his friends
wanted to help their friend and thought the
only option was to go to his home.)
No one called the cops - not a single
soul thought to call the police. I was on the
Xbox, and I was talking to some friends
that actually knew him, and they were like,
“Hey, why don’t you call the cops?” And I
was pretty emotional at the time, I was like,
“If I call the cops, they’re going to come kill
him and the person that’s coming to get
him.”
But in this dream, we’d all have called
the cops.
Davis: For me, a lot of my friends live in
Beaverton, and when I go over there with
my friends to hang out, I’m cool, but
sometimes, like taking the bus and stuff, I
get a little nervous. When I’m with my
family and we drive over there, on two
separate occasions - we have a minivan,
and there’s seven of us in our family -
we’ve been tailed by the police; like just
tailed. And sometimes when I go over
there, I get nervous. What if I’m walking
and someone just like - they have no ill
intentions, nothing against me personally,
but just because of a stereotype, they call
the police? It could be something where I
end up getting arrested or end up being
dead. I dream of a world where I never
have that fear.