"When They See Us": A Certain Kind of Boy

I knew that watching a miniseries like "When They See Us" would be tough. I have yet to finish all of the Kalief Browder documentary series because of how emotionally taxing it is. I saw some people said they left Ava DuVernay's series on in the other room while they were otherwise occupied so she could get her streams. All because they were well aware that this series would be too much. I cried, sobbed, bawling, heaved, felt nauseous, peeped through my fingers, gasped, and so much more over the two nights in which I watched this horrifying telling of reality. What I've done, instead of writing up the entire series on the whole or doing a meditation on the demonization of young boys of color, is mused over what stuck out to me most at the end of each episode. If you're wary or concerned or don't think you'll be able to watch Ava's series, try reading this instead.

Episode 1

There is something triggering and visceral about the way you feel when you watch Ava DuVernay‘s films. I wasn’t even able to get through the first episode of the 4 that make up “When They See Us” without breaking into tears. Just that episode alone strike fear and horror in me over ever having a child to raise in this country. The fact that these boys were between 14 and 16, demonized, made to feel they had no way out, KNEW they were lying and were FORCED to lie anyway is despicable and disgusting. I feel sick to my stomach over it. We as the public must be careful never to believe the first thing you hear in the media about a case. If you heard only what the media said about these boys, you would immediately conclude that they did it, not that they were a group of unaffiliated adolescents who were coerced into lies in the worst way, all under the premise of “being able to go home” which is all any of us want to do, really. It terrifies me to think of what could happen when you have a Black son, stopped by the police, who fits the description because the “description” fits literally half the Black men you’ve ever seen walking down the street. I would question bringing one into this world for that very reason.

Let us never become so acclimated to hearing of boys of color being imprisoned that we do not question the process, how they got there, where the truth ends, and lies begin.

Episode 2

The tears didn’t stop in case you were wondering. Despite the fact that I knew the outcome, despite the fact that I knew the results, despite the fact that I knew how hellbent the city of New York was on putting these Black and Latino youths behind bars, I still had hope. I hoped with every fiber of my being that the jury of these trials would see all the cracks in the state’s case. That they would clearly know, these boys didn’t do it. They weren’t even in the same area. They’re kids.

But no. That isn’t what happened. Because some prejudices run deep. And the past cannot be changed or rectified. No matter how hard you try. No matter how much you wish it could be.

Episode 3

When they say “boys will be boys,” they only mean a certain type of “boy.”

The actual Central Park 5

Episode 4

I can barely express the sheer heartbreak felt when you see a boy no one cared about, experience care and kindness from a prison guard at Attica. The hurt experienced when you see Korey, a young man who skipped so much school he can barely read and a guard, giving him magazines in attempt to stimulate his learning and a chia pet because he liked them. Seeing his mom cry because she didn’t even have any money to give him for commissary. Seeing him come to the understanding that he needed to stay in solitary confinement and literally risk his mental state, all to keep from getting continuously jumped, all to stay alive? Even the guards saw him as ripe for the picking and the selling. I can only begin to imagine the ways in which that is soul-crushing. Year after year after year.

I want to make it clear that I understand the urgent need for swift justice. A woman was hurt, brutalized, in all of the worst ways. That however does not excuse the ways and means used to completely coerce totally false confessions from youths of color who happened to be in Central Park that same night. Do you even realize how big that park is? How many things can be going on there at the same time with absolutely no relation to each other whatsoever? The fact that these men were not exonerated until 2002, that those who worked tirelessly to put them behind bars is simply unacceptable. Emotion runs high throughout this series. It makes you understand how the smallest moments can drastically change your life permanently. Things you’d never expect. I don’t have much more to say about this apart from prison abolition needs to happen and it needs to happen yesterday. Fuck prisons and Rikers and Attica and corrupt cops and corrupt lawyers and all those who scoff at hope. And perpetual blessings and favor on the men who survived such inhumane treatment. 

All of this begs the question, what would have happened if the group of boys running through the park that night had been a different kind of "boy?"

xx