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melannrosenthal 's review for:
The Black Kids
by Christina Hammonds Reed
“I am always saying things are cool when maybe they aren’t. Sometimes I have so much to say but I can’t say anything at all.”
Told through the lens of the prescient voice in 17-year-old Ashley, the narrator, this book presents a too-familiar tale of racism in America framed by a deep, marvelous writing style. In the heat of the lack of justice despite Rodney King’s beating recorded on videotape, Ashley is struggling to reconcile the privilege her parents’ financial security affords her, with how the rest of LA sees her, a Black girl, outside of her private school.
“My parents and grandparents have made it so that Jo and I know nothing. We know nothing of crack or gangs or poverty. We know nothing of welfare or Section 8 housing or food stamps or social workers. We know nothing of schools with metal detectors and security but not books. We know nothing of homegoings or small coffins. We know nothing of hunger. We are, according to my father, spoiled rotten little brats.”
It’s, unfortunately, easy to forget, despite the constant references to styles and music and other pop culture of the time, that this was in 1992 and not 2015 or 2020: “When activists argued that chokeholds were proving to be unnecessarily deadly force, Los Angeles police chief Daryl gates actually said this about how blacks and Latinos responded to chokeholds: ‘We may be finding that in some blacks when it is applied, the veins or arteries do not open up as fast as they do in normal people.’ Normal people. That was 10 years ago, and he is still the police chief. Yesterday, when the verdicts were announced and the city was a powder keg, he left LAPD headquarters to go to a fundraiser in Brentwood to fight police reform efforts.”
This is a coming-of-age that everyone needs to read. It’s endlessly thought provoking. I slowly meandered my way through, stopping and starting often to give myself pause to consider what Ashley was sharing.
Told through the lens of the prescient voice in 17-year-old Ashley, the narrator, this book presents a too-familiar tale of racism in America framed by a deep, marvelous writing style. In the heat of the lack of justice despite Rodney King’s beating recorded on videotape, Ashley is struggling to reconcile the privilege her parents’ financial security affords her, with how the rest of LA sees her, a Black girl, outside of her private school.
“My parents and grandparents have made it so that Jo and I know nothing. We know nothing of crack or gangs or poverty. We know nothing of welfare or Section 8 housing or food stamps or social workers. We know nothing of schools with metal detectors and security but not books. We know nothing of homegoings or small coffins. We know nothing of hunger. We are, according to my father, spoiled rotten little brats.”
It’s, unfortunately, easy to forget, despite the constant references to styles and music and other pop culture of the time, that this was in 1992 and not 2015 or 2020: “When activists argued that chokeholds were proving to be unnecessarily deadly force, Los Angeles police chief Daryl gates actually said this about how blacks and Latinos responded to chokeholds: ‘We may be finding that in some blacks when it is applied, the veins or arteries do not open up as fast as they do in normal people.’ Normal people. That was 10 years ago, and he is still the police chief. Yesterday, when the verdicts were announced and the city was a powder keg, he left LAPD headquarters to go to a fundraiser in Brentwood to fight police reform efforts.”
This is a coming-of-age that everyone needs to read. It’s endlessly thought provoking. I slowly meandered my way through, stopping and starting often to give myself pause to consider what Ashley was sharing.