When a Dad Role Model Is Not Immediately Available — a Baltimore Riot Video Shows the Difficulty of Dealing with Male Adolescence

© 2015 Peter Free

 

29 April 2015

 

 

A few seconds of video illustrates components of America’s societal problems

 

Put yourself in this single mother and son’s shoes:

 

 

Hezakya Newz & Entertainment, Extended Raw Footage: Baltimore City Mother WHOOPS Her Son AZZ For Participating In RIOTS!!, YouTube (27 April 2015)

 

 

Notice that

 

Toya Graham’s 16-year-old son is dressed in the impressionistic equivalent of a black ninja outfit, undoubtedly selected to set a testosterone-appealing mood.

 

To his credit, he does not lash back at his irate mother. And I suspect that his determined sense is that he is on a mission to support his assassinated brother in spirit, Freddie Gray:

 

 

The racially charged violence on Monday was set off by the case of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died of a spinal-cord injury under mysterious circumstances while in police custody.

 

A line of police behind riot shields hurled smoke canisters and fired pepper balls at as many as 200 protesters Tuesday night to enforce a citywide curfew, imposed after the worst outbreak of rioting in Baltimore since 1968.

 

Demonstrators threw bottles at police, and picked up the smoke canisters and hurled them back at officers. No immediate arrests or serious injuries were reported, and the crowd rapidly dispersed. It was down to just a few dozen people within minutes.

 

The clash came after a day of high tension but relative peace in Baltimore, as thousands of police officers and National Guardsmen poured in to try to prevent another round of looting and arson like the one that rocked the city on Monday.

 

It was the first time since the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968 that the National Guard was called out in Baltimore to prevent civil unrest.

 

© 2015 Amanda Lee Myers and David Dishneau, Police Clash with Baltimore Protesters for a Second Night, Associated Press (29 April 2015) (extracts, resequenced)

 

A man’s gotta do what he must. Right, Mom?

 

 

Channeled properly, this boy might have the inner fire that is necessary to fuel great things

 

The implicit social tragedy captured by this short video is revealing. However, I doubt that many viewers will see it for what it actually represents about the state of our society. Hezakya Newz & Entertainment, for example, chose to put the video’s second half to upbeat music, as if this is just another amusing piece of Americana.

 

 

The moral? — Controlling male adolescents is difficult at the best of times . . .

 

Throw in justified rage, an urban riot, and father role model’s absence —and things really get tough for good parenting.

 

Civil order in a purportedly free society depends on just governance and deep and broad family guidance. When both go to hell, especially under conditions of poverty and/or cultural oppression, it is not surprising that disorder erupts.

 

We will sweep this under the rug, as we always do. And things will resume in the diseased way that we are complacently accustomed to. What’s a young energetic guy and his upstanding mom to do?