My family made sure I had all the tools needed for me, to be my best self. My grandparents made sure I knew how to educate myself, they raised me with unconditional love and they made sure I stayed on the right path. Now let me give you some insight of my childhood. The first ten years of my life I spent in Queens, NY with my great grandmother. She had a substantial savings. We lived in a two family house, I went to private school, had a big backyard where we would garden every spring. I had great friends and I lived around other kids that had families that owned their own homes as well. Because of my great grandmother's age I had to move to Brooklyn to stay with her son, my grandfather . Now this environment was completely different from Queens. The part of Brooklyn I lived in was a poverty stricken area where violence, drugs, and ignorance was apart of daily life. On my way to school one morning I had to step over blood because one of my friends got killed the previous night and nobody cleaned the building yet. I was blessed to have a grandfather that had a great job, and he had a teenage daughter that was able to assist him in taking care of me. They made sure I got everything I needed, I stayed out of trouble and in the summer I went back to queens to stay with my great grandmother. My point is that because of Divine  intervention, a great family, and great role models I was able to escape the mouth of poverty. Where I come from the pipeline to jail is enhanced because all the systems that are available for you end up working against you. That means that the education system works against you. Having a broken family structure works against you. Your doctors and the medicine they give you work against you. The economy you live in works against you. The society you live in works against you. Now if you're a kid growing up without the proper tools to combat these issues, can you explain to me how this you're supposed to make it out of poverty.

The power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.
"we do have some freedom of choice".

The system that we live in America benefits off the demise and the suffering of its citizens. Poverty within itself is a socially created system put in place so that wealthy people could benefit off the destruction of citizens that are not financially stable. In order for you to make it in America no matter your skin color you need a positive family structure, a diverse education, connection to spirit and self, and you need the help of a positive community as well. Now when you look at families that are broken, that only have one parent, that can only do certain jobs because they don't have the credentials to get a better job. When you look at a community that doesn't support you. When you look at the fear that police put in people everyday. Some families have to worry about their child leaving out and never coming back because of police brutality. When you look the economy and how it really only caters to the rich and wealthy. Because of the recession of the 21st century there is barely a middle class because banks and particular corporations. Millions of people are left without financial stability. If money is the new cotton and we all are slaves to it answer this question for me. If millions of people that worked for 30 years are now out of their pensions do you think that if you work for 30 years that you will have some big pot of gold waiting for you at the end of the rainbow. The way America is set up you need money to do everything, and if you don't have enough of it you basically become a slave to it because you have to work to get everyday. It's like this county put together a plan to make the citizens of this county in a position where we all are dependent to money. It makes very hard to live when the only thing you think about is money.

Meanwhile for schools like Boys and Girls the Graduation rate is 42 percent for Seniors. The amount of students that graduate in four years and enrolled in college is 28 percent which is below the 63 percent city wide average. Now let's examine a school like Stuyvesant High School, where the graduation rate is 98.5 percent and 98 percent enroll and are ready for college. This is one example on how one group kids are given the resources to free and do what they want in life. The other is example of a school where the society around them is failing them and already think the worst about them anyways. Now let's look at the economy, 77 percent of American are living pay check to paycheck. Fewer then one and four Americans have enough money in their savings account to cover at least six months of expenses. So what does that mean, you give this job all your time, they give you 2 week vacation out of 12 months. You spend all your time working and still don't have a substantial amount of saving to not work. That's slavery to me. This freedom that we were lead to believe we have is an illusion. We will never be free while banks and corporations control our faith. In 2015 people of color spent a trillion dollars on buying things like cars, TV's, expensive bags, things that don't support their demographic and that will only decrease their savings. How about we open our eyes and realize we are in a system that was build for the less fortunate to suffer. America makes its most profits when we suffer, if we want freedom we need to take back control over our lives. You shouldn't have to work 40 years for a peace of mind. You shouldn't be working to accomplish somebody else's dream before you accomplish your own. People of color built this county, and continue to, yet will not receive anything in return. People of color were the first stock in America and will be the last.