President Donald Trump is being denounced for deploying the National Guard and federal law enforcement agents on the streets of Washington, D.C. His critics, especially members of the Congressional Black Caucus, accuse him of “militarizing” the police.
But what none of them offer is an alternative solution to the rising tide of youth violence destroying our neighborhoods. That alternative solution is precisely what we need most.
Let me be clear: hard power — tough policing, longer sentences, more prisons — can temporarily suppress crime. It can clear corners, silence gunfire for a season, and create the appearance of order. But it cannot heal the wounds of our communities. It cannot transform despair into hope. And it cannot prevent the next generation from picking up where the last one left off.
At least the president recognizes there is a problem. His critics rage from the sidelines but propose little more than slogans. Meanwhile, funerals mount, children duck bullets on their way to school, and grieving mothers bury children lost to a culture of death. If we are serious about saving lives, we must look deeper than the barrel of a gun or the presence of a patrol car.
The Woodson Center has long argued that the most effective weapon against violence is not brute force, but moral force. And we’ve done much more than merely make the argument: We’ve seen programs we supported and developed transform entire communities on the basis of this philosophy.
We must reach into the hearts of our young people, strip away the malice, bitterness, and rage, and replace them with hope, discipline, and purpose. You cannot arrest emptiness. You cannot imprison a lack of meaning. Until we fill that void in the souls of our children, no amount of soldiers or police will keep them from destroying themselves and each other.
One root of that despair lies in the poisonous narrative fed daily by what I call the racial grievance industry, the merchants of division and despair. These voices insist that America is irredeemably racist, that every Black failure is the result of White oppression, and that our children are powerless victims of “systemic forces” beyond their control.
Day after day, young people hear: You are hated. You are helpless. You are incapable. And is it any wonder that some embrace hopelessness or act with rage? If you convince children they are unworthy, do not be surprised when they live as if life itself has no worth.
The truth is this: Safety, redemption, and peace will not come from Washington, nor from soldiers on our streets. It will come when we stop feeding lies to our children and start nourishing their souls with hope, purpose, and the knowledge that they are capable of greatness. It will come when men and women of faith, courage, and conviction rise up in their neighborhoods to model love, discipline, and moral clarity.
We helped the late housing reformer Kimi Gray take over 464 units of public housing decades ago. In 1966, she moved into Kenilworth Courts, a public housing project. She was a 21-year-old divorced mother of five children. The housing unit she moved into was infested with huge rats. Junkies squatted in vacant apartments. The heating broke often and help was slow to come.
Gray began restoring her development by convincing the residents they must take responsibility for improving their own behavior and self-respect before demanding the same from others. This included refusing to buy stolen goods, disciplining their children, and cooperating with the police.
To get rid of the drug dealers, they cooperated in police raids. When drugs were stashed under the tires of parked cars, they immediately notified the police and turned on fire hydrants. When testifying in court, groups of tenants would appear to collectively “snitch”. The sons and brothers of these women warned the drug dealers against any retaliation.
There was a dramatic reduction in crime. With help from the Woodson Center, the residents went on to take managerial control of the property, becoming a national model for empowerment.
Because of her success, she ended up advising presidents on housing policy. She sent every one of her own children to college, in addition to hundreds of others. Streets in two cities are named after her because she rose up within her own neighborhood to help model self-respect, moral conviction, and love.
A decade later, another example of a soft power approach emerged to reducing youth violence. In 1997, the Benning Terrace public housing development saw 53 young people murdered within a two-year period. While two warring crews battled one another, the police were reluctant to enter the community, as the streets and recreation centers were empty.
The Woodson Center had been advising a small group of men, some ex-offenders, called The Alliance of Concerned Men. They were exceptional in winning the trust of street youth and city officials, and were seeking ways to expand their influence.
When a twelve-year-old boy by the name of Darryl Hall was brutally murdered in Benning Terrace, the Alliance responded by brokering a gang truce. The killing ceased immediately, and there was not a single crew-related murder for twelve years. Upon notification of the peace, the residents of Benning Terrace flowed into the streets. The young combatants were converted to ambassadors of peace and became moral mentors and character coaches to the next generation. There was not a single murder in the neighborhood for years afterward.
The lessons learned from this experience have become the foundation of the Woodson Center Violence Free Zone Program. It has been successfully implemented in five cities. Milwaukee, Wisconsin, has incorporated it into its schools’ budget. Baylor University evaluated and documented its success.
Just as the sickest parts of the body draw the strongest antibodies to promote healing from within, some of our greatest grassroots leaders hail from the most troubled neighborhoods. They, more than anyone, are in the best position to heal their communities from within.
No matter where you are, a very small cohort of people, men or children, controls the culture within any institution. If you build relationships with that cohort, you can quickly transform an entire community. But building relationships is among the most difficult work we can undertake, and it has to be done by lifting up people from within the afflicted communities.
These on-the-ground human assets are utterly irreplaceable. Far too often, reformers and well-intended outsiders rely on technocratic solutions. They assume that metal detectors or surveillance alone can prevent violence. They assume that more funding, curriculum changes, or school uniforms will improve student behavior.
Technocratic solutions will not solve the problem on their own. Only people can ultimately solve problems with people. Only people can bring the healing necessary to thwart an intergenerational cycle of anger, violence, retaliation, and degradation.
More importantly, only people from within the communities that suffer under this cycle can know the pain well enough to soothe it.
IT’S NOT A PROBLEM DC ISNT A STATE; IT’S THE POINT
Yes, we may need the police to restore order. But only truth and transformation can bring peace. We don’t want to be “tough on crime,” we want to be effective on crime.
America does not have a policing problem; it has a purpose problem. And until we fill that void, the cycle will continue.
Bob Woodson is the founder and president of The Woodson Center and the author of A Pathway to American Renewal: Red, White, and Black Volume II.