by Maija Zummo
11.14.2008
Arthur Magazine
When my ex-boyfriend lived with me, he got a subscription to Arthur Magazine. I had never heard of this magazine before Adam, but judging from the cover, I thought it seemed like a real new-age hippie kind of thing. I was right. It is. And it just keeps coming to my house because he never changed the address.
by Bart Campolo
11.11.2008
The Camaraderie and Draw of Hopelessness
Twelve years ago a dear
friend of ours took a badly neglected baby boy away from his crack head
mother and made him her own. That boy, David (name changed to protect his anonymity), is now a strong, quiet,
menacingly handsome teenager who adores his “Mom” and grudgingly
appreciates our fellowship, but is increasingly attracted to street life. Well loved as he is, we will lose him before long.
Inner-city street life now is like crack cocaine was back in the 80s: So potent that almost anyone who tastes it becomes an instant addict. The difference is that while I never understood how anyone who had seen a crack zombie could even consider trying that stuff, I know all too well why boys are drawn to the corner like moths to a flame. To paraphrase the title of Chris Hedges' recent book about the narcotic nature of war, street life is a force that gives them meaning.
As a foreign correspondent for the New York Times, Hedges saw war up close in the Balkans, the Middle East, and Central America, but his descriptions of the ways desperate people mythologize the glories of conflict, demonize their enemies, corrupt their own language and culture, and becoming preoccupied with grim perversities of sex and violence remind me of behaviors I see in Walnut Hills, and not only among the hardcore soldiers of the drug trade. In a very real sense, many of our neighbors here embrace the physical and emotional intensity of their daily struggle for survival the way WWII General George Patton embraced combat. “Compared to war,” he said, “all other forms of human endeavors shrink to insignificance. God, I love it so!”
Young David is not so eloquent, but he and the older boys he admires feel much the same. Their gun battles and fistfights, their ceaseless movement from house to house, their ready money and easy sex and their constant vigilance against the police and the other gangs, create for them a sense of immediacy and camaraderie that no classroom, sports program, or regular job can match. Hustling for food, shelter, the next dollar or the next high does the same thing, not only for junkies and prostitutes, but also for lots of ordinary poor people navigating the traps and hazards of underclass America. There is no peace in the midst of these struggles, but there is plenty of drama, excitement, and singular purpose. Again, street life is a force which gives them meaning.
What street life does not give, I have come to understand, is true friendship. Instead, the various street soldiers I know here experience that same kind of closeness that real soldiers find in combat, which Hedges describes as comradeship. The essential difference, he writes, is that where friends find in their relationships a heightened awareness of their individual identities, comrades suppress--and thereby escape--such self-awareness in the pursuit of a common purpose. In their shared struggle for survival, they learn to value one another primarily on the basis of shared danger and immediate utility.
In other words, David has a better chance of taking a bullet for one of his buddies on the corner than he does of discovering the other boy’s fondest hopes or deepest fears, or his own for that matter. They may be together for decades, in and out of prison, drunk and high and straight, fighting side by side for money, or women, or whatever they mean by respect, without ever really understanding what makes each of them uniquely precious.
It isn’t just the boys on the corner, either. It is the girls who flock to them, too, and their babies, and all the others who get caught up in the madness they make out there. No matter how long they live that life together, in the end they are always alone.
That is the real horror of street life, I think: Not that we will lose David, but that he will lose himself, and in the process, everything else in the world that matters. In the Bible, they call it his soul.
The longer I live here, the more helpless I feel. If only true love was even half as attractive as it is beautiful.
BART CAMPOLO is a veteran urban minister and activist who speaks and writes about grace, faith, loving relationships and social justice. He's leader of The Walnut Hills Fellowship.
Inner-city street life now is like crack cocaine was back in the 80s: So potent that almost anyone who tastes it becomes an instant addict. The difference is that while I never understood how anyone who had seen a crack zombie could even consider trying that stuff, I know all too well why boys are drawn to the corner like moths to a flame. To paraphrase the title of Chris Hedges' recent book about the narcotic nature of war, street life is a force that gives them meaning.
As a foreign correspondent for the New York Times, Hedges saw war up close in the Balkans, the Middle East, and Central America, but his descriptions of the ways desperate people mythologize the glories of conflict, demonize their enemies, corrupt their own language and culture, and becoming preoccupied with grim perversities of sex and violence remind me of behaviors I see in Walnut Hills, and not only among the hardcore soldiers of the drug trade. In a very real sense, many of our neighbors here embrace the physical and emotional intensity of their daily struggle for survival the way WWII General George Patton embraced combat. “Compared to war,” he said, “all other forms of human endeavors shrink to insignificance. God, I love it so!”
Young David is not so eloquent, but he and the older boys he admires feel much the same. Their gun battles and fistfights, their ceaseless movement from house to house, their ready money and easy sex and their constant vigilance against the police and the other gangs, create for them a sense of immediacy and camaraderie that no classroom, sports program, or regular job can match. Hustling for food, shelter, the next dollar or the next high does the same thing, not only for junkies and prostitutes, but also for lots of ordinary poor people navigating the traps and hazards of underclass America. There is no peace in the midst of these struggles, but there is plenty of drama, excitement, and singular purpose. Again, street life is a force which gives them meaning.
What street life does not give, I have come to understand, is true friendship. Instead, the various street soldiers I know here experience that same kind of closeness that real soldiers find in combat, which Hedges describes as comradeship. The essential difference, he writes, is that where friends find in their relationships a heightened awareness of their individual identities, comrades suppress--and thereby escape--such self-awareness in the pursuit of a common purpose. In their shared struggle for survival, they learn to value one another primarily on the basis of shared danger and immediate utility.
In other words, David has a better chance of taking a bullet for one of his buddies on the corner than he does of discovering the other boy’s fondest hopes or deepest fears, or his own for that matter. They may be together for decades, in and out of prison, drunk and high and straight, fighting side by side for money, or women, or whatever they mean by respect, without ever really understanding what makes each of them uniquely precious.
It isn’t just the boys on the corner, either. It is the girls who flock to them, too, and their babies, and all the others who get caught up in the madness they make out there. No matter how long they live that life together, in the end they are always alone.
That is the real horror of street life, I think: Not that we will lose David, but that he will lose himself, and in the process, everything else in the world that matters. In the Bible, they call it his soul.
The longer I live here, the more helpless I feel. If only true love was even half as attractive as it is beautiful.
BART CAMPOLO is a veteran urban minister and activist who speaks and writes about grace, faith, loving relationships and social justice. He's leader of The Walnut Hills Fellowship.
by
02.05.2010
Keeping Animals Safe in Winter
With Greater Cincinnati’s worst storm of the season fast approaching and much of the nation already covered in snow, PETA is offering tips about how to keep animals safe in cold weather — along with a little help from Country singer Loretta Lynn.
Although they are naturally equipped with fur coats, dogs and other animals still can suffer from frostbite and exposure, and they can become dehydrated when water sources freeze.
by Stephen Carter-Novotni
12.15.2008
2,000-Year-Old Computer Resurrected
Jacques Cousteau described then Antikythera mechanism, a First Century B.C. computer, as being more valuable than the Mona Lisa. The device has been reconstructed a number of times. This video is the latest and illustrates the device's gearing and clockwork that was more than a millennium ahead of its time.
by Stephen Carter-Novotni
11.24.2008
Monday Wellness Roundup
Personal Health
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NYT: Texas evangelicals realize that sex is a good idea.
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WSJ Health Blog: Reading side effects on drug labels can make you sick.
by
08.13.2010
Event Set for Homeless Animals
Two local animal welfare groups are joining forces to commemorate International Homeless Animals Day on Aug. 21.
The United Coalition for Animals and Cincinnati Pet Food Pantry will hold an event at Twin Lakes in Eden Park. It will include music, a blessing of the animals and a candlelight vigil at dusk.
by
08.05.2010
Free Trees to Good Homes
If your yard could use a little more greenery or you're interested in helping people in the urban core breath a little easier, the Cincinnati Park Board has a deal for you.
by Stephen Carter-Novotni
10.06.2008
Monday Wellness Roundup
Christian Science Monitor: The Supreme Court is considering whether smokers in Maine can sue Philip Morris USA for marketing "light" and "low tar" cigarettes. At issue is whether these descriptions are misleading and fraudulent, indicating these cigarettes are healthier than regular smokes. (Hopefully PM will be sued out of existence.)
The Enquirer: Prosthetics improve the lives of vets injured in the Iraq War. (How long until they ask for people with prosthetic limbs to go back onto the battlefield?)
The Simple Dollar: How you can become a millionaire by 30. (Which, of course, we already all are here at CityBeat.)
Live Green Cincinnati: 10 ways to go green. (More important now than ever.)
Wall Street Journal: Smokers may benefit from CT scans for lung cancer. (They might also benefit from a smoking cessation program.)
New York Times: Fat acceptance folks challenge the health risks of obesity. (Which is insane.)
— Stephen Carter-Novotni
