An article was written a few weeks back concerning the difference between “affluenza” and “hood disease.” Since many had never heard the term hood disease everyone thought it was something disrespectful that white people had simply made up. Ironically, both are unfortunate misnomers for conditions that actually exist. Affluenza is actually defined by the dictionary means “a pyschological malaise supposedly affecting wealthy young people, symptoms of which include a lack of motivation, feelings of guilt, and a sense of isolation.” Hood disease is an crudely named description of PTSD which is a real condition. There has been years and years of studies that have alluded to individuals in urban areas maybe suffering from PTSD but none that have gone mainstream.

 

First let me deal with the bullshit. Affluenza needs not even be discussed. That was one of those what you call “one offs.” A nonsense term that a slick lawyer came up with to justify the actions of a slick ass judge. They already knew what they were going to do and needed a way to pitch it to the public, especially since that same judge had sent a black kid to prison for a decade for the same crime minus the whole messy and inconvenient death part.

 

As far as “hood disease” is concerned, which is highly disrespectful to the people who suffer from it, don’t ever believe that it is something made up. As far back as the 1980s studies have shown that inner city residents are at risk for PTSD. First let me put in layman’s terms what Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is. PTSD is defined by the Diagnostic Statistical Manual as an type of anxiety that develops after a person is exposed to one or more traumatic events, for example, sexual assault, serious injury, threat of death, witnessing certain traumatic events, etc. A real good description can be found on wiki for those that want to delve deep into the affliction. What is interesting about the subject is that the greater society howls at the top of their lungs to deny that inner city dwellers may suffer may have an “excuse” for their aberrant behavior. They refuse to accept the diagnosis because it is supposed to only benefit them in the overall scheme of things.

 

For an analogy. Let’s take two hypothetical situations, lets call one subject Jason and the other Jeffrey. Jason grew up in the suburbs, not a exceptionally good student but not a bad one. Middle of the pack type white kid, didn’t hang with the stoners but wasn’t one of the cool kids either. Upon graduation from High School Jason didn’t have the grades to get into anything better than maybe Community College or DeVry. So Jason decides to follow in the family footsteps and enlist in the Army. Since Dad was a Ranger and Grandfather Milo was a paratrooper in WWII, Jason figures he’ll make them proud and become a shooter. (Infantry) What is floating around in the back of Jason’s mind is that his father was a Vietnam Vet and even though he was an outwardly good guy, he was subject to rages that went way beyond the offense at hand. Like the time he broke Mom’s hand because she burned the steaks, or the time the police had to be called when he had a meltdown because the cashier didn’t give him all his change. People used to whisper that maybe dad was shell-shocked due to his military service. So Jason makes it through Boot Camp and is promptly shipped off to Afghanistan at the tender age of 19. He is thrown head first into battle only days after arriving in country. He witnesses things, terrible things, children blown in half, mother’s wailing over the bodies of dead husbands and children. He’s done terrible things as well. He had to protect his brothers, even when his brothers were involved in things that were maybe a bit morally gray. There was also the time that the IED went off under the vehicle directly ahead of the hummer he was in. That was terrible as well, not really knowing which pieces went into which body bags. There was the time he had to be evacuated back to base with a head wound when a AK47 round missed his head by inches but the shrapnel lodged in his jaw and temple. War changes you, anyone who has ever served will tell you that. You may think you know, after all, you watched Apocalypse Now, or the Longest Day or Seal Team Six. You, however, have no idea what its like to be hyped on adrenaline every day for months and months at a time. You have no idea what its like to be surrounded by people who you have no experience with their culture and mannerisms. You never know when the woman, or the child, who is walking towards you wants water or to blow up your squad.

Now Jason is back in the States, his tour of duty finally over. Luckily for him, maybe, Army doctors recognized that Jason was hyper-aggressive, easily excitable and maybe needed to go home and be treated while he “transitions” back into civilian life. What happens instead is that Jason is hooked on that aggression, he longs for the days that there was “action” around him. He goes out and buys every weapon he can get his hands on and spends countless hours cleaning and firing his weapons with other like minded buddies. They sit around and reminisce over the time that the could shoot people at will with no consequence. He joins a militia when he learns that that spineless negro in the oval office wants to pull all troops from the country so many of his brothers died in. How dare he decide that all the land they fought for and took be given back to the people he was fighting. So Jason decides HE must be the one who does something about it. So he “guns up” and goes to the local federal government office and begins shooting people, he eventually executes 25 innocents before he is killed by authorities.

 

Then there is Jeffrey. Jeffrey lives on the south side of Chicago in a neighborhood that used to be the home of Cabrini Green, the huge monolithic slab of concrete that used to house hundreds of families in what can only be described as a civilian prison. Since CB is gone the problem of poverty and despair has been dispersed throughout communities all over the south side. Jeffrey’s community however is especially hard hit, with no industry to employ the hundreds of thousands of young men contained with a small area. Gangs are the employer of choice among these men and from an early age, Jeff has had to learn which streets to walk down and which to avoid. He knows that on some streets, the gang affiliation changes within the block with the north side of the street being GD and south side being VL, cross the avenue and the next block is LK. Now these gangs don’t kill you because of some stupid shit like you wear red and we wear blue. They kill you because you are an unknown. EK is the order of the day in some neighborhoods, “everybody killa.” Jeffrey was a fairly good student, stayed out of trouble, one of those kids that the teachers didn’t notice because his grades weren’t good enough to be pushed to go to college but he wasn’t an obvious gang banger so he was off that radar as well. What people didn’t know about Jeffrey was that Jeffrey had secrets. Jeff had seen things. Jeffrey was raised primarily in a household with his Mother and his 2 siblings. He knew who his father was but never saw him because he was locked up in Statesville for killing a guy during a robbery. He still remembers the last time he saw his father. That night that he came running through the door bloody and told his Mother that he needed money because he had to leave town. He remembers his mother telling him no and his father becoming enraged and striking her. He remembers telling his father to “stop hurting my mommy.” He remembers being told “shut up lil nigga, stay out of grown folks business.” He did stop though and soon thereafter left the house. He never saw him again. He was six years old at the time, some 11 years ago. Who he did see was his younger sister’s father, she’s now thirteen. He was around for a while, started out great, took them to the park, bought them ice cream and McDonalds. It was all a front though to have a place to lay his head. As soon as he moved in, all the gift buying and excursions stopped. Jeffrey found out that he was an alcoholic and a pedophile. He remembers being “babysat” by him while Mama worked. Jeffrey remembers him getting drunk and touching him and his baby sister. Jeff remembers him saying that “your Mama ain’t gon believe your lil ass.” Jeff remembers his own abuse after telling his Mother but mostly he remembers the abuse his younger sister suffered because indeed, his Mother did not believe him. He remembers the day Mom came home sick from work one summer day to catch him in the act. He remembers the day like yesterday because that was the day his Mother went to jail for murder. The police said that she didn’t have to stab him 47 times two hours after discovering the act.

 

They didn’t understand that his Mother was 5’2” on a good day and maybe 125 lbs soaking wet. They didn’t understand that she had to wait until he was defenseless before she exacted her revenge. He only sees him Mom every once in awhile now. Usually on her birthday when he goes with his Grandma to see her in Joliet. She’ll be home in five years. This was between the ages of 7 and 11 years old. Jeff continued to school even after all the gangs in the neighborhood tried to recruit him. Even after seeing his best friend killed while they attended a football game against a school in a rival neighborhood. He also remembers the week he spent in the hospital recovering from the vicious beating he and other friends took attending a basketball game against a suburban school by a bunch of Simon City Royals. He still bears the scar of the bullet that grazed his head while walking home from a girlfriends house. He remembers the senseless killing all around him. He remembers the first dead body he saw at the age of 10. He remembers the first dead kid he saw at the age of 11. He remembers the first actual killing he witnessed, his mother murdering her boyfriend. He remembers the fact that kids his age are more likely to end up on an obituary list than a graduation list.

Now Jeff is 20. Out on his own due to frequent arguments with his Grandmother about getting a job, helping with the bills and being an example to his one remaining sibling and his nephew. His younger sister ended up addicted to drugs and was killed in a drive by. She was standing next to the intended target, her baby daddy who was a high ranking member of some set of the local gang, he never found out which one, not that it mattered. All that mattered was the young girl who he tried to protect when they were younger, the girl who was raped numerous times by the time she was 15 is now gone and granny is left to raise he young son at the age of 79. Jeff has started packing since where he goes there is danger everywhere. He smokes too much weed and drinks a little too much. He is smart enough to realize that his life is spiraling out of control but he doesn’t know how to stop it. He lives now with his girlfriend who he loves and may be willing to marry. He does everything for her, including babysitting her kids while she works. He cleans house, and cooks meals. He feels funny lately because she seems to work late now more than often, sometimes not coming home till well after the time the kids are asleep, leaving him to feed, bathe and read stories alone. One day he comes back to the apartment and finds her in bed with another guy. They argue and Jeffrey feels something boiling over, something comes undone, he snaps, he shoots the guy, then he shoots her. When the police arrive, he shoots one of them before they shoot him.

 

Of course in these two stories we see parallels. We see the basis of a diagnosis of PTSD. Both individuals are witnesses to brutality, to traumatic events. Where as Jason has had to kill, Jeffrey has been the victim of sexual assault. Both have had their lives under constant assault, Jason in the line of duty, Jeffrey in the live of everyday living. Jason enlisted into situations that brought about his disorder, Jeffrey was born into it. Why then does it make sense to label Jason as suffering from PTSD and Jeffrey as not? Nowhere in the practice of Psychology/Psychiatry does it distinguish how or where you suffer these traumatic events, just that you suffered them at all. Simply a casual look at the symptoms of PTSD can describe most of the brothers/sisters we know. Since we know now that traumatic events can be genetically passed down through generations, why do we not think that the conditions we live in do not affect our behavior. I have long lobbied and advocated for PTSD to be used as an affirmative defense at trial. What we don’t realize is that PTSD is not just a “white” disease suffered by veteran’s returning from battle. It can and does affect everyone. We can carp about personal responsibility all day long but mental health afflictions such as PTSD, Depression, and Bi Polar Disease are just as prevalent in the “hood” as they are in the “burbs.” Sure, everyone doesn’t succumb to the extreme manifestations of these disorders, but most of us who grew up in the inner city know its there bubbling just beneath the surface. When we go back to the neighborhood, we feel our senses become excited. Our vision becomes clearer, when we approached by someone we don’t know, we pay close attention to their hands. We look around and begin to relive/remember/reminisce. That was the corner where Meek an em, got shot at. The hole in the wall of granny’s living room, I remember when that happened. I remember the shot breaking her picture window and missing my granddaddy by about a foot. I remember my first real fight in the backyard of that house right there. Even the smell of the neighborhood brings back memories, the hood always smells like something is burning due to all the homes in disrepair being set ablaze by kids with nothing to do. We remember how we hear sirens from passing police cars and ambulances at least twice an hour. We remember how sometimes the only excitement on the block is when the police show up. We remember how simply walking down the street can make you nervous when the cops show an interest in you. We remember how we still pucker a bit when the police pulls behind us at a stop light even though we’re grown with grandkids and haven’t done anything wrong.

 

What we don’t realize is that all those are symptoms of PTSD. Just like not all soldiers coming back from war act on the urges that their PTSD even though depending on who you ask, as many as 30% of all soldiers return with PTSD. Not all sufferers of PTSD in black communities act on their affliction. It makes sense, however, to do the math and use logic. If a soldier can come back from war with PTSD after only a few months to a couple of years, why can’t an resident of the inner city suffer from PTSD after experiencing the stressors that cause PTSD for YEARS UPON YEARS? It doesn’t make sense until you look at it through the eyes of the government. To establish the legitimacy of PTSD in the inner city is to open the door disability for sufferers, making it a public health problem like measles or polio, and giving sufferers a reason why they act the way they do which has criminal justice ramifications. Oddly enough, its not even just a black thing. That’s why “hood disease” is such a odd concept because take everything I just postulated about Jeffrey and change hood to small rural community or projects to trailer parks, same result. Change his name to Juan and hood to barrio. It becomes a poor people thing.

 

With affluenza, the rich can game the system in a way that sufferers of PTSD never can. Only a minute few people can ever be rich enough to not know right from wrong. The system can absorb that, what the system cannot is thousands upon thousands of poor people claiming that their actions are beyond their control due to them suffering from a disease. A disease that is caused by the rampant poverty they are surrounded by.

 

Drops mic and walks from stage drippin blackness . . .

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001923/#adam_000925.disease.symptoms