“All the eyes of the world is focused on the Jena Six. But every small community in the south, and in the north, has its Jena Six. Maybe you can’t visualize it or maybe you don’t want to visualize it, but this is not just small rural towns. Look at New Orleans, during the storm. When the people was trying to cross the bridge to get out of the flood, there were people on the other side, armed, that would not let them cross. In the rest of the nation people are being treated the same way. Chicago, New York, it don’t matter where you are.
“I’m gonna do what I know is right, and I don’t care who you are. I see the young people in the community that need help. That’s what keeps me going. If you see something and you feel it aint right, don’t say they ought to change it, get in there, roll your sleeves up and say lets change it. That’s the only way. You gotta keep a cool head and do the thing that’s right. When you know right and fight for it, you’re gonna win.”
~ Hayward Fair
Although much attention gets placed on the large metropolitan cities of the world, the small Louisiana towns of Jena and Tallulah demonstrate that equally (if not more so) important battles for social justice are being fought in the small rural towns as well.
The prison industrial complex is a beast that is swallowing up more and more people everyday. As of this writing, the Board of Regents of Higher Education in Louisiana has stated plans to tear down the barbed wire fences of Tallulah’s prison by the end of the year. Let’s hope that Tallulah can show the rest of the world that education is the path out of poverty and onto success, not prison. Keep up the good work, Mr. Fair, and good luck; although as he would say, “Luck ain’t got nothin to do with it.”
“I’m probably in the sky, flying with the fishes,
Or maybe in the ocean, swimming with the pigeons,
See my world is different,
Like Dwayne Wayne,
And if you want trouble, bitch, I want the same thing…”
~Lil Wayne, “Sky Is The Limit”
Lil Wayne does live in a different world than the rest of us. No question about it after seeing the man do his thing live in Monroe, Louisiana last week. He did everything from epic versions of “Sky’s The Limit” and “I Need A Hot Girl” to playing live guitar on “Leather So Soft.” It also helped that he was in his home state and the crowd (which was about 50/50 men and women, mostly high school and college kids) gave him much love. In turn, he gave the crowd much love and gratitude, on top of an energetic ass show. In this post-Katrina America, Weezy as a New Orleans rapper with New Orleans swag and pride has risen to a different level of the game. As he says on “Gossip”: “It rains a lot in my city cuz my city’s cryin’, cuz my city’s dyin’, but I emerge from all of that I am a livin’ pion, Neer, Zion…Fear God Not Them.”
With the recent movement for justice in the case of the Jena Six, Louisiana is being revealed for the racist state that it is. The history of slavery and the southern plantation economy runs deep here, and it shows in the small town of Tallulah, devastated by dirty politicians and a huge prison placed right in the heart of the town’s Black community. This town is America in its purest form, so beautiful and ugly at the same time. A train track divides the Black and White parts of town, with the “wrong side of the tracks” symbolism so real here that you forget its 2007. The segregation and look of hatred in the eyes of White residents is a reminder of America’s bloody legacy. Through it all, a coalition of community residents fights to convert the Prison in its backyard into a Success Center; which would constitute a community college providing job training and skilled trade degrees, a center providing social services to the community and an organization actively working to encourage businesses to come to the region.
This is where the movement sparked by Jena should move its attention to. This, which would be the nation’s first prison-to-school conversion, is so much more than a headline. This is a fight to shape the new South. Do we continue to invest in a racist prison industrial complex? Or do we decide to invest in education? The struggle for Tallulah’s future is a struggle for the future of America.
You can read more about this fight here, and if you feel so moved, write a letter to Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco and let her know your thoughts on the struggle.
Office of the Governor
P.O. Box 94004
Baton Rouge, LA 70804-9004
The Box has set up shop temporarily in Tallulah, a small town in the North East Delta Region of Louisiana. As it is a rural area, internet connection is not always a given. Thus, I apologize for the delay in new updates. Tallulah is home to what was arguably once one of the worst youth prisons in the country. Through organizing and activism, the community here was able to close down the prison a few years ago. You can read about more of that struggle here. The state of Louisiana promised to convert the prison into a comprehensive community college/success center, but has continually dragged its feet on the issue. To this day, the prison remains standing in the town as a reminder of all that is wrong in the region. The movement for the community college conversion is picking up steam once again, and if successful, could serve as a model that the whole country could follow. I’ll be posting thoughts and reflections periodically. Stay tuned.
The Box has set up shop temporarily in Tallulah, a small town in the North East Delta Region of Louisiana. As it is a rural area, internet connection is not always a given. Thus, I apologize for the delay in new updates. Tallulah is home to what was arguably once one of the worst youth prisons in the country. Through organizing and activism, the community here was able to close down the prison a few years ago. 
