Ethnic Allied Gangs Here at DVI

As of late, I am ashamed to say I have been some issues with racism, as in I’m feeling a bit racist myself. I think being incarcerated is having an adverse affect on my psyche. This is certainly crazy especially since my first wife was Mexican and my son is one-half Mexican. But please, let me explain my dilemma. Prison, or rather, DVI RC is at least 90% Chicano and within the confines of these walls, they are divided into 5 or 6 groups or gangs. Now I used to subscribe to the prison politics that lent itself to the divisions but I abandoned that mode of thinking. It’s foolish, perpetuates genocide and is based on juvenile thinking.

Most of us share the same class and social standing and most are superb artists, but a lot can’t spell or articulate themselves well. I help then with appeals for some of the basic things. And while I am working with these other inmates, I may become involved in their conversations, and this leads to nothing but trouble. The conversations are foolish, juvenile and cumbersome to say the least. Tribalism reigns in here! And not only is the prison population Chicano, but so are the cops and they tend to favor their own people. Not all, understand, but some do in every race.

But I am pretty fed up with this. I’m not a hater of people because of their ethnicity, but I seem to falling into a trap of stereotyping and this is having an adverse effect on me and right or wrong, my tolerance is wearing thin. I am getting angry with people because of their ethnicity and this isn’t me!

Dudes are loud, ignorant, think they know it all and don’t realize that they come off as simpletons. I find it difficult to concentrate because of the “games” they engage in which are really figuratively speaking “pissing contests”, but they aren’t that quiet and apparently volume means superiority of some kind.

I feel like I am becoming racially prejudiced towards a people I love, but my reality here is that I am around so-called gang members and they haven’t yet figured out that a people divided are powerless, so they carry on with the GANG games all day long.