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Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1652
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - 02:50 pm: | 
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Too bad Stan didn't apply himself like this forty years ago--he's a goner
November 29, 2005
Live from Death Row
An Interview with Stanley Tookie Williams
By PHIL GASPER
Sanley Tookie Williams, co-founder of the Crips street gang in Los Angeles over 30 years ago, is facing execution on December 13. Over the past 12 years, Williams has publicly apologized for his past, written a series of award-winning children's books to keep kids out of gangs, initiated a Peace Protocol that has led to gang truces in cities such as Newark, New Jersey, and been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. (For more details see "Saving Tookie Williams".)
On November 25, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced that he will hold a hearing on December 8 to consider clemency for Williams. Earlier that day I spoke to Williams by telephone.
SOME PROSECUTORS, police and prison officials have been trying to discredit you by saying that you are still an active gang member. What's your response?
IT'S QUITE a spurious allegation that these people are putting out. The fact of the matter is that I have a report from the San Quentin Institutional Classification Committee from 2004, which quotes a lieutenant saying that he hadn't observed anything that was gang-related about me for the past 10 years. It also commended me for 10 years of a positive program.
So it's quite contradictory for a San Quentin spokesperson-or anyone else, for that matter-to state that I'm still involved in gang activity, when that same person's superiors say I've been programming positively for over 10 years.
SOME OF the same people say that if you were serious about opposing gang violence, you would allow the authorities to "debrief" you on what you know about the Crips. Do you have any inside information that could be used to weaken the Crips or other gangs, and why have you refused to be debriefed?
THE FACT of the matter is that "debriefing" is a euphemism for snitching-telling on people. In my redemptive transition, I vowed to myself not to participate in any kind of violence, or anything that would harm other people, and for me to tell on another person is, in my opinion, harming another individual.
But first and foremost, I have no information.
Secondly, there's another contradiction with these individuals who continuously promote this claim about me. As it stands, the Departmental Operations Manual clearly states that the only gangs or individuals who will be debriefed are prison gangs. The Crips and the Bloods are not considered prison gangs. Prison gangs are those that were formed and created in the prison.
If I were a gang member, and if there was any iota of data that showed this, I would never have left the hole. I was in there in solitary confinement for close to seven years. And if debriefing was necessary-if it was legal for a street gang-then they would have done that to me then.
THE MEDIA has made much of the fact that you have never apologized to the murder victims' families in your case-you've said that you would rather die than lie about something you didn't do. Do you have anything you would like to say to the victims' families?
IF I had the opportunity to talk to talk to any victims' family members, I would say that I can empathize and I sympathize with their loss of a loved one. I would say the same thing to anyone who has lost a loved one.
However, in regards to me apologizing, it would be wrong of me to apologize for something I didn't do. I didn't commit those crimes. I've been averring my innocence since day one, and it is the truth. So I cannot apologize for something I didn't do.
It would be wrong of me. It would be a coward's act. I would be craven to proclaim guilt for something I didn't do. And that's why I say that I'd rather just go on and die than to lie about something that is so untrue.
WHAT MADE you decide to redirect your life and dedicate yourself to helping kids?
I'VE LIVED a pathetic life, and I believe it was education that helped me to change. It was through education that I was able to create common sense and use reasoning. And it was through this that I developed a conscience that led to my redemption.
This is something I feel I was obligated to do as a man, period-to do something that would help youth out there. I feel obligated to try to convince them that the life that they wanted to live or are thinking about living-the so-called thug life, or the gang life, or the criminal life, or the drug life-will ruin their lives forever. I was motivated to do something in my small way-to make a contribution.
SOME PEOPLE out there want to blame you as an individual for pretty much all the gang violence that exists. What do you think are the underlying causes that result in gangs and street crime and violence?
FIRST AND foremost, it's an impossibility to blame one person for the ills of society. That's just like Black people trying to blame one white person for slavery and what followed. That would be ridiculous.
But I believe the center of the problem is self-hate, which is a very destructive mechanism that people pick up, because of the conditions not only of society but the morbid mindset of how they look at things.
I believe that this is the motivating factor of gangs. It was to me. That's why I had no qualms about initiating aggression toward people who looked like me-in other words, toward Black folks. It was a sense of trying to erase or obliterate that which reminded me of myself, in the negative.
WHERE DO you think that self-hate comes from?
IT COMES from conditioning. And when I say conditioning, we're talking about conditioning that's propagated not only on television and on the radio, but through encounters with the police department, with people in economic positions and in almost any institution-the prisons, the juvenile halls, the police stations, the youth authorities, etc.
There's an inveterate form of racialism that exists, and it perpetuates a negative stereotype. These things are out there.
As a youngster growing up, I had the unenviable experience of digesting the most negative stereotypes about Black folks being illiterate, being criminals, being violent, being promiscuous, being indolent, etc. When you're spoon-fed these things on an incessant basis, you eventually morph into those negative stereotypes, unwittingly. That's what happened to me. I became the stereotypes that I was spoon-fed.
As far as amending the problems, I believe that education is the key. I know I consistently talk about this, but I believe it, because it's what woke me up. It was my form of an awakening-though over a period of time, because I've never had an epiphany or anything like that. I had to undergo years of battling my demons.
What I did was I picked up parts of the most negative aspects of society, and I built my character, I built my persona. And I became what I built-a monster. That became my identity.
WHAT ACHIEVEMENT in your life are you most proud of?
MY REDEMPTIVE transition-being able to alter myself from one extreme to the other.
If you would have told me 15 years ago that I was going to change my life, that I would write children's books, that I would be helping thousands upon thousands of children, that I would eventually be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, and that they would eventually make a movie about me, I would have looked at you as if you had lost your mind.
The reason is because, being a Crip, so-called "cripping" was all that I knew. I felt that would be what I would do for the rest of my life. It was all I knew. I felt that was my reason to exist.
So quite naturally, I thought that was how I would die. I would live until a bullet to the back of the brain, or what have you. I never expected to do anything else, because that was my raison d'etre. There was nothing that could penetrate that armor of the gang life at that time.
That's what I thought-until, to my amazement, something did. What happened was that I was slowly but surely becoming human.
MANY OF the people who are campaigning around your case are opposed to the death penalty in general and are fighting to end it. I wonder if there's anything you'd like to say to the anti-death penalty movement in this country?
I'M VERY grateful that they exist, for one thing-because as you and I both know, there wasn't any type of anti-anything for many years.
I'm very grateful that there are people out there who possess the goodness to be willing to help save the lives of many of us they don't even know. They know nothing about our backgrounds, but yet they know that killing is wrong, and that the death penalty isn't a deterrent, and it's not solving any problems.
Throughout this nation, the death penalty population and the overall population within prisons are getting larger and larger. If there were a deterrent effect, then prisons would be empty. We're talking about over 600 on death row in California alone. If a person can deduce from this that the death penalty is working, then something is wrong with their reasoning.
But the death penalty has become a pawn that politicians use all the time. You have politicians who didn't used to be supporters of the death penalty, but once they get into the political arena, they alter their position. They become proponents of the death penalty, because that is the zeitgeist of the moment-the politically correct way to be.
Some people can do it. I couldn't do it. What they're doing is what many people expect me to do in regards to apologizing for crimes I didn't commit-just to save my life. Of course I want to live, but not by having to lie.
A longer version of this interview will appear on Socialist Worker Online. To support clemency for Stan, visit http://www.savetookie.org. Educators can sign the "Educators for Tookie" letter at http://www.nodeathpenalty.org/EducatorsTookie.html.
Phil Gasper is Professor of Philosophy at Notre Dame de Namur University in California and a member of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty. He has nominated Stanley Williams for the Nobel Peace Prize four times. He can be reached at pgasper@ndnu.edu.
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Libralind2
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Libralind2
Post Number: 298
Registered: 09-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, November 29, 2005 - 09:47 pm: |
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Tavis will have William on tonight I believe
LiLi |
Chrishayden
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 1655
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 30, 2005 - 11:21 am: |
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Don't even count the thousands of casualties of gang warfare nationwide that Stan is indirectly responsible for (his Co founder of the Crips, Raymond Washington, was gunned down back in the 70's)he is personally and directly responsible for hundreds himself during the 70's--according to Soyinka Shakur (Monster Kody Scott) a lot of the guys tried to introduce positive values into the Crips and wean them from gangbanging and drugdealing during the 80's and Stan and several other OG's helped squelch it.
I am generally opposed to capital punishment but if Stan don't get it nobody should--I would hope that if I would find myself in his situation I would not give people the satisfaction of seeing me plead for my life-- |
Ntfs_encryption
Regular Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 35
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 01:11 pm: |
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I agree totally with Chrishayden. Stanley Tookie Smith (I’ve seen the name Tookie in quotes before which is a mistake, his real middle name was Tookie –not a nick name) made a decision about his life –to be a vicious street thug who would ruthlessly punish anyone he felt disrespected him or incorrectly cross his path. He was convicted of four senseless brutal murders during a robbery. But anyone with a brain knows he was never charged nor convicted for the numerous killings he committed to maintain his pecking order as a senior leader of the notorious Crip gang. As Chrishayden noted, Monster" Kody, now known as Sanyika Sakur, spent 16 years as a "gangbanger" in South Central Los Angeles. In his book, he accounts beginnings as a Crip at age 11. Throughout his book, he conveys a sense of the siege mentality that prevails every minute of every day, due to a relentless daily barrage of gang-on-gang violence. This is the same world that Tookie Smith immersed himself in. But it did not stop there. Derivative spawns of the Crips soon emerged (e.g., Rollin' Sixties, Hoovers, Grape Street Watts Crips) to further the cancer of violence, intimidation and death. Bodies of rival gang members and the innocent became staggering statistics in this senseless war that mocks civilized human behavior. Tookie Williams was at the helm of this pandemic malignancy.
Jessie Jackson and the NAACP were pathetically railing away at Arnold Schwarzenegger for not granting clemency. There was no need for him to do so. If I raped and sodomized my daughter for the first 16 years of her life, should I be exonerated for telling her that I am sorry for what I did when she is 32 years old? Should I not be held accountable for what I did even though I stopped and ceased doing it after her 16th birthday? Should there not be any accountability and punishment for what I did? Tookie Williams never apologized nor repented for the four murders. He claims he never did them. But anyone who examines the evidence against him can clearly see that he was guilty and not a victim of some kind of nefarious law enforcement conspiracy. He cannot claim he received a weak public defenders defense. He had very good defense lawyers working pro bono on his behalf. If anyone has taken the time to notice, the appeal courts, both state and federal, routinely overturn prosecutions and death penalty cases if there is clear evidence of impropriety, an unacceptably suspect defense and collusion. It did not apply to Tookie Williams.
I take no glee in seeing anyone put to death. But when you make a conscious decision to put yourself in a situation where you callously murder, physically assault intimidate people for more than half your life and then expect to be seen as a “victim”, you get no sympathy from me.
Anti-death penalty activists usually use the statistical lack of deterrent as reasoning to end the death penalty. Personally, I'm not concerned whether the death penalty is a deterrent or not. Why? Because speeding, car theft, insurance fraud, tax evasion, rape, physical assaults, trafficking of child pornography and illegal drugs are all against the law also. But yet it continues unabated. Since incarceration for all of the aforementioned doesn’t act as a deterrent, should we discontinue the respective prohibitive laws since people continue to defy them? I don’t think so.
It is unfortunate that Tookie Williams was put down by the state. But as I said before, I take no glee in seeing anyone being terminated. But Tookie himself had no problems terminating the lives of others back in the day. And as I mentioned before, you know he had to cancel a few rival gang members and others who stood his way (something he was never charged with) of being at the top dog of one of the most violent and brutal gangs in American history. As The saying goes; “YOU LIVE BY THE SWORD, YOU DIE BY THE SWORD”. E’nuff said.
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Ntfs_encryption
Regular Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 36
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 01:16 pm: |
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I agree totally with Chrishayden. Stanley Tookie Smith (I’ve seen the name Tookie in quotes before which is a mistake, his real middle name was Tookie –not a nick name) made a decision about his life –to be a vicious street thug who would ruthlessly punished anyone he felt disrespected him or incorrectly crossed his path. He was convicted of four senseless brutal murders during a robbery. But anyone with a brain knows he was never charged nor convicted for the numerous killings he committed to maintain his pecking order as a senior leader of the notorious Crip gang. As Chrishayden noted, Monster" Kody, now known as Sanyika Sakur, spent 16 years as a "gangbanger" in South Central Los Angeles. In his book, he accounts beginnings as a Crip at age 11. Throughout his book, he conveys a sense of the siege mentality that prevails every minute of every day, due to a relentless daily barrage of gang-on-gang violence. This is the same world that Tookie Smith immersed himself in. But it did not stop there. Derivative spawns of the Crips soon emerged (e.g., Rollin' Sixties, Hoovers, Grape Street Watts Crips) to further the cancer of violence, intimidation and death. Bodies of rival gang members and the innocent became staggering statistics in this senseless war that mocks civilized human behavior. Tookie Williams was at the helm of this pandemic malignancy.
Jessie Jackson and the NAACP were pathetically railing away at Arnold Schwarzenegger for not granting clemency. There was no need for him to do so. If I raped and sodomized my daughter for the first 16 years of her life, should I be exonerated for telling her that I am sorry for what I did when she is 32 years old? Should I not be held accountable for what I did even though I stopped and ceased doing it after her 16th birthday? Should there not be any accountability and punishment for what I did? Tookie Williams never apologized nor repented for the four murders. He claims he never did them. But anyone who examines the evidence against him can clearly see that he was guilty and not a victim of some kind of nefarious law enforcement conspiracy. He cannot claim he received a weak public defenders defense. He had very good defense lawyers working pro bono on his behalf. If anyone has taken the time to notice, the appeal courts, both state and federal, routinely overturn prosecutions and death penalty cases if there is clear evidence of impropriety, an unacceptably suspect defense and collusion. It did not apply to Tookie Williams.
Anti-death penalty activists usually use the statistical lack of deterrent as reasoning to end the death penalty. Personally, I'm not concerned whether the death penalty is a deterrent or not. Why? Because speeding, car theft, insurance fraud, tax evasion, rape, physical assaults, trafficking of child pornography and illegal drugs are all against the law also. But yet it continues unabated. Since incarceration for all of the aforementioned doesn’t act as a deterrent, should we discontinue the respective prohibitive laws since people continue to defy them? I don’t think so.
I take no glee in seeing anyone put to death. But when you make a conscious decision to put yourself in a situation where you callously murder, physically assault and intimidate people for more than half your life and then expect to be seen as a “victim”, you get no sympathy from me.
It is unfortunate that Tookie Williams was put down by the state. But as I said before, I take no glee in seeing anyone being terminated. But Tookie himself had no problems terminating the lives of others back in the day. And as I mentioned before, you know he had to cancel a few rival gang members and others who stood his way (something he was never charged with) of being top dog of one of the most violent and brutal gangs in American history. As The saying goes; “YOU LIVE BY THE SWORD, YOU DIE BY THE SWORD”. E’nuff said.
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Tonya
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 1127
Registered: 07-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 04:31 pm: |
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***...his real middle name was Tookie –not a nick name.***
Get the fuck out of here! His name wadn't no goddamn "Tookie", was it?????? Now, I've heard Pookie & Dookie.. but NEVER as a real name--You mean ta tell me his name was actually "Tookie?"
I tell you, man.. black people never cease to amaze me!
Tonya |
Ntfs_encryption
Regular Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 41
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, January 02, 2006 - 02:32 am: |
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Tonya wrote: "***...his real middle name was Tookie –not a nick name.***"
Yep! It’s true. But what is more unfortunate, is the new trend in segregation by names that a generation of blacks are indulging in. At one time, blacks and whites used to give their children pretty much the same names. As a child, I recall black girls with names like Barbara, Helen, Roberta, Janet, Sharon or Mary. Black boys had names like Aaron, John, Robert, Charles or David. No more. Since the 1970s, racial segregation has returned, this time in names.
Even though Tookie was of the baby boomer generation, his first name was Stanley. Tookie was just a middle/nick name. But now, black females (X-generation) have names like T’Nique, Mo’Nique, LaSandra, Shawanda and Keresha. Young black males are given equally ridiculous names. It seems as if black people take great pride in making up names that have no history, meaning or purpose. This simple minded behavior has lead to a generation of young blacks being “marked” with ghetto labeling.
Just last week, a young transient man (23 years old) was shot and killed by the San Diego police for allegedly threatening them with a screw driver (about six SDPD cops with their guns drawn, all felt threatened for their lives –yeah, right!). His name was “Trevall Deshawn Williams”. Hmmmmm…let’s see…I bet he was a white guy.
California is leading the way with the most extreme examples of these embarrassingly ignorant names, as it is of so many other extreme trends. More than 40 percent of the black girls born in California during a given year have a name not found among even “one” white girl born in the same state!
Black parents who think they are doing something clever or cute — or just "making a statement" — when they name their children, should consider what the consequences could be later in their childrens lives. Marking their children with these pathetic childish made up ghettoized names is not helping their children’s future.
I’m not opposed to eclectic or unusual names. I think there are beautiful African or non-African names that are very exotic that can be given to children. The names have a documented history and they also have meaning. This current fad of making names up for the sake of being different and trendy is sad. Very sad.
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Serenasailor
Newbie Poster
Username: Serenasailor
Post Number: 14
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, January 05, 2006 - 06:15 pm: |
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First off, Stanley Tookie Williams should not have been executed heres why.
He was never given a fair trial. He was tried in front of a jury that was comprised of no African Americans. Also the prosecutor on his case had gotten in trouble twice before for prosecutorial misconduct. Since Stanley has been on death row he had never had access to the "evidence" that convicted him.
Stanley has done more for the community than any death row inmate has ever done. I don't see Charles Manson wrinting childrens books. Also Charles Manson is in San Quentin as well. He is not facing the death penalty for all of the murders he committed.
Stanley is in jail because his victim were white and asian. Do you think that if Stanley's victims looked more like him he would be on death row? I think not. The whole time I heard about his crimes the only person that was mentioned was that white Vietnam war veteran that he murdered. Stanley Tookie Williams made the mistake of killing a well-respected white man.
Third, I want to pose a question to all of you Negroes in here that are judging him. Where were you when brothers like Stanley Tookie Williams was growing up? Where were you to take brothers like him aside and say you know what young brother you don;t have to go this way there are so many things a young brother like you can do with your life.
Stanley was never placed at the scene of any of his crimes. Also, the crips are not even a real gang in the prisons. Go to San Quentin. The Mexican Mafia is a real gang. 18th Street is a real gang. But the Crips are so small and insignificant. I don't see nobody going after the founder of these gangs and trying to execute them. Now they are responsible for alot of murders.
So check yourself before judging brothers like him. Look in the mirror and see if you are doing all that you can do to benefit your community. And if you are then you can judge him and brothers like him adversely. |
Serenasailor
Newbie Poster
Username: Serenasailor
Post Number: 15
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, January 05, 2006 - 06:25 pm: |
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Ntfs_Encryption you have got to be one of the most ignorant niggers I have ever heard in my life. You are probably some stupid white man posing as black to try to insult black ppl. People name their children according to their own experiances. People should have the right to name their kids whatever the hell they want. So what if these names don't meet to white American Standards. Its niggers like you that run around trying to assimilate with whites hoping to be accepted. Why don't you take your sell-out, house-negger, Bill Cosby worshipping ass back to that lily-white community that you think loves you so much. I'll bet that when you leave those white ppl that you are trying to assimilate with are calling you all kinds of niggers behind your back. Black ppl and white ppl are different! We have a different culture. White ppl name their children according to their culture and black ppl according to theirs. Stop getting mad at black ppl because they don't all strive to be house niggers like you. SHAME ON YOU!!! |
Mrs_hart
Veteran Poster
Username: Mrs_hart
Post Number: 54
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 02:43 pm: |
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DAY_UM! |
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