You can count on three fingers how much Al Sharpton has in common with Pastor Corey Brooks, the pastor who’s on a 100-day rooftop “campout” in frigid, single-digit weather to bring attention to the culture of violence and poverty in Chicago.
They’re both black. They’re both focused on issues in troubled black communities. And they both hold titles as members of the Christian clergy.
Other than that, these men are worlds apart in their approach to solving the generational problems of blacks – especially young black men – in urban areas.
Sharpton curses the darkness from a distance, then adds to it. Brooks builds his home in the middle of the darkness and shines a light. With cameras staring, Sharpton shouts from pulpits about “wickedness in high places” (meaning Trump and Republicans) while fanning the flames of wickedness in low places at every opportunity. Brooks throws himself into harm’s way to put out those flames by creating opportunities for young black men who are engulfed by a culture of deviancy, and by challenging them to take responsibility for their own lives.
“Race is not the biggest problem that we face in the United States of America,” said Brooks, “and it’s definitely not the biggest problem that we face in Chicago. It’s easy to say, ‘the white man, the white man’ when in reality we need to take a closer look at ourselves. … And you have to take responsibility.”
But no matter how irresponsible young black criminals are during run-ins with cops, Sharpton exploits the imagery of “white cop against black man” to raise money for his organization, and to conjure up the superstition that the criminal system is unjustifiably weighed against blacks. Since there’s no money in the back-breaking labor of changing the criminal, Sharpton wants to change the whole criminal system.
Here’s the hard truth: Police are disproportionately in troubled black neighborhoods because young black men commit a disproportionate amount violent crime. Massive crime drives mass incarceration. To reduce mass incarceration, reduce massive crime.
At a golden moment when the entire planet expressed unanimous sympathy for George Floyd and outrage against one bad cop, Sharpton couldn’t resist using the imagery to push a narrative that Floyd is proof that America’s criminal system is rotten.
The country has never been the same.
As businesses were burned, looted, or shuttered and innocent people were killed, Sharpton – like a proud rooster – strutted around the country cock-a-doodling that what we were witnessing was wickedness reaping the wrath of justice.
“All over the world, I seen grandchildren of slave masters, tearing down slave master statue over in England, and put in the river,” Sharpton said in a “sermon” at George Floyd’s funeral, noticeably wearing black gloves. “… I’ve seen whites walking past curfews saying, “Black lives matter. No justice, no peace.’ … You have now lived to where you’ve sown wickedness. And now you have to reap the wrath of those that don’t want to be wicked no more.”
Pastor Brooks is no Rev. Al Sharpton.
He’s gotten his hands dirty in a broken community where the sound of gunshots is as common as dog barks, as one CEO put it. He’s mostly out of the limelight, mostly ignored, and mostly vilified by left-leaning disciples who’ve sacrificed common sense for the political pieties of fundamentalist wokeness.
“I believe the church is the hope of the world,” said Brooks, founder of Project H.O.O.D, and pastor of New Beginnings Church of Chicago. “We’ve seen a lot of young guys in the neighborhood who don’t value their lives. A lot of it is a result of not having someone to encourage them that ‘You can do better,’ … if you don’t have those messages going forward, it’s hard for you to value life when everybody is shooting and killing.”
Inside one of the most dangerous police districts in Chicago, men with ears to hear are listening.
Varney Vokerv and Lavondale “Big Dale” Glass are two of many. Once mortal enemies in rival gangs, they spoke with Brooks on Day 39 of one of his daily “Rooftop Revelations.”
“We tore the neighborhood up. Seriously tore it up,” said Glass, whose son was killed in a gang-related shooting last Halloween. “Enough is enough.”
Glass told The Epoch Times that he’s now looking to “right his wrongs” by helping put young black men on the right path, most of whom come from broken homes where mothers are struggling to feed and clothe them. Many turn to crime.
“It’s not the right way,” said Glass. “It’s only a one-way ticket to either jail or Hell. … Many of these kids … are really just looking for a father figure.”
“We was raised up with a gun in a pack …” said Voker, whose son was paralyzed several years ago after being shot at 30 times. “Our older guys, they misled us. If I knew what I know now, I would have took a different route in life.”
Voker and Glass, who teamed with Brooks on Project H.O.O.D’s Violence Impact Team, are credited with preventing as many as 50 retaliation killings a month in Chicago. This is stuff that gets to the root of the problem but rarely, if ever, make the headlines.
But you do see Sharpton, who’s rhetoric perpetuates division, discontent and death, and who supports people like Alvin Bragg, Manhattan’s first black district attorney, who wants reduce mass incarceration by lowering the definition of crime.
You see Obama and Oprah – both with ties to Chicago – lavishing their influence and incomes on government solutions to imaginary problems: “whiteness” and systemic racism.
You see the Marxist group Black Lives Matter flourishing around the globe, filthy rich from George Floyd’s death but impoverished on ideas of how to actually enrich black lives in troubled communities – communities governed by black mayors, black police chiefs, black judges, and black district attorneys.
Then there’s Pastor Brooks, and a handful like him, who stares in the eyes of the elephant in the room, hammers a stake in the ground, and commits to the back-breaking work of piecing together broken human beings.
I don’t know for sure, but I’m guessing none of the most celebrated blacks and organizations – overwhelmingly liberal – donated a dime to Pastor Brooks, who’ll be camping on the roof until Feb. 28 to raise $35 million for a Leadership and Economic Opportunity Center designed to be a nerve center for fighting violence and poverty.
Especially Al Sharpton, whose livelihood would be jeopardized by shifting his focus from racial pyromania to shining a light on the real problems in troubled black communities.
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