Jonathan Kozol: Amazing Grace Jackie Gonnelli

"I saw a boy shot in the head right over there," he says a moment later, in a voice that does not particularly sad, then looks up at me and asks politely, "Would you like a chocolate chip cookie?" (p.6)  This was my first "wow" moment.  This child is so desensitized that seeing a boy shot was not dramatic or horrifying, it was normal to see things like that in his area. 

"Why do you want to put so many people with small children in a place with so much sickness?  This is the last place in New York that they should put poor children.  Clumping so many people, all with the same symptoms and same problems, in one crowded place with nothin' they can grow on?  Our children start to mourn themselves before their time" (p. 11)  I asbolutely agree with this statement.  Why should they keep small children with any sort of bad influence?  I understand that resources are limited but what's stopping the government from taking these children away from parents with addiction problems and other problems.  They know they exist, so why let their lives be flushed down the toilet just because their enviroment.  Where are the police officers in this neighborhood?  Why is drug addiction not seen as breaking the law?  I understand that they don't want disease to spread so they pass out clean needles- but who's to say if people were taking to rehab or given any sort of step up from the rest of that group- that they wouldn't benefit and possibly influence others?  Again, I'm assuming it all goes back to money related issues.  It's just unfortunate.

"If poor people behaved rationally," says Lawrence Mead, a profesor of political science at New York University, "they would seldom be poor for long in the first place...argue that the largest portion of the suffering poor people undergo has to be blamed upon their own 'behaviors,' a word they tend to pluralize" (p.21).  As easy as it would be to agree with this, I don't.  It's not just their fault and it may in fact be partially our fault.  People doing bad things are raising children who are raised only by seeing their surroundings.  Obviously if they aren't being given other opprotunities or being showed the direction they should be aiming for- they are just going to fall into their parents footsteps.  So in reality, who's to blame?  We are the ones who are fortunate enough to be raised and succeed in society- why aren't we helping those who don't know their potential?  People need to be shown their possibilities and then pointed in the right direction.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52PGtllLU18 (Poverty Reduction in the U.S.)