The Rat’s Nest
We called our gym on 149th St. “the rat’s nest,” both out of love and disgust. It was our home away from home but the filth and squalor weighed on us.
Once a rat died in the walls and there was a horrific stench for days. Another winter, the water pump broke. There was no water or plumbing for a month. The gym was so unkept that people joked that the roaches zoomed past us on dune buggies, as we jumped rope.
There was a certain pettiness that existed within the subculture of the gym. It was a reflection of the level of oppression in the community. Many of the trainers were addicts themselves. Former legends nodded off in a corner, in between holding pads for their fighters. Sitting in the wrong chair, picking up someone’s El Diario newspaper or hitting someone else’s speed bag was tantamount to a sin. Every square inch of the gym, every nook and cranny had its owner. You have to know where to set your stuff down and where you can sit. Wander into the wrong territory and you will be paid a visit by Shakur For Sure or Coach Too Smooth. For someone who strived for a world without fences, borders or private property, I was resistant to all the rules. I learned the hard way.
Making Enemies
Mean Debbie is as tough as nails. She won the woman’s city championships so many times, the USA boxing bureaucracy eventually told her she couldn’t fight any more. Everyone said she had the biggest dick in the gym. The enforcer., she set the rules. “No training without a shirt on.” “No going behind the desk.” “No touching the gym equipment.” “No talking to another trainer’s fighters.” “No training without paying your dues.” “Don’t sit on the ring.”
Mean Debbie caught me one day doing sit ups and weighing myself without a shirt on. She charged at me, accusing me of disrespect. I made the fatal error of ignoring her as I hit the showers. The next day, I worked the pads with one of Choco’s fighters. I told a young Irishman why pay the $10 bucks to get pad work if we can do it ourselves? Mean Debbie was on the attack. She told everyone I was stealing fighters and training them myself to take them to upcoming tournaments. The rumor mill was in full swing. The trainers see their fighters as both their sons and daughters and their most coveted possessions. Without them what do the trainers have? A heroin or alcohol habit but no substance to boast about. Explosive arguments and fist fights erupted because of misunderstandings about who a fighter “belonged” to.
When I returned the following day, Mean Debbie and Choco’s irate glares stalked me from one side of the gym to the other. I felt the tense energy as I jumped rope and hit the speed bag. I thought to myself: “I have enough problems in the real world. All I want is peace in my home away from home.” I approached Mean Debbie to break bread but I was public enemy #1. She refused to make eye contact with me. I had to nip this in the bud. I asked her if I could sit down with her to apologize. I soothed things out and promised not to “disrespect” the gym again. I asked if she wanted to grab a bite. A plate of rice, beans and chicken later, everything was restored to its natural order.
My 12-year-old son Ernesto training with his friend Jonathan. On the right, is Tongo, a 7 foot poet and fighter. There is nothing that compares to a conscious fighter, cast in the image of the greatest of them all, Mohammed Ali.
Crossing the Line
The ghetto dialectic is that 90% of the hood hates the police; the other 10% aspire to be police.
The police exist to keep poor people in their place, corralled up in a world that has no economic function from the point of view of the profiteers. The ghetto exists to contain surplus bodies. How many of the children I work with today, the generation coming up, after we did, will soon be warehoused away in prisons? A young man has more of a chance of going to prison on 1 4 9 than of graduating from high school.
The police represent the law of the rich and white world. They are the order of the propertied class. I have nothing but disdain for how they treat people. I have seen it and lived it for 36 years. For more on why I take this position on the police, I participated in this interview after the police murder of 18-year-olds Vonderrett Myers Jr. and Michael Brown in Missouri.
The reader can imagine how conflicted I felt when an old ring foe or training partner disappeared from our world and reappeared a year later, after having graduated from the police academy? I noticed how much their attitudes changes. One former fighter bragged about sticking their forearms in guys’ necks and how they can lock up some “punk” for jay-walking or spitting. These individuals were lost friends to me. They crossed a line. I bumped into Nicaraguan Pete on 3rd Ave. He was in his uniform, working a beat with a young officer. He knocked my ass to the canvas more than once when we were fighters in our early 20’s. He told me how no money was coming in and he didn’t know what else to do with himself. He was happy to see me but asked me not to tell anyone that he was a police officer now. He severed relations with his old boxing periphery because he did not dare tell them he was now a police officer.
This is Old School. A veteran of many wars, Old School’s uniquely-located tattoo sums up one of the hood’s strongest and most consistent sentiments: Fuck the Police!
Crimes of Desperation
Who are “the bad guys” Nicaraguan Pete and the graduating classes of officers are patrolling and incarcerating?
Darius’ story was representative of so many aspiring fighters. He swore he was going to make it big. But in a world that only rewards the top .05% of the most talented, Darius never had a chance. Tall and lanky, he was outmatched in the Cruiser Weight division. He ended up being a professional punching bag. His pro record was 1-9. He stood in for a round or two, collecting his beating and a $1,000 pay check to pad up-and-coming fighters’ records.
One night he had no train fare to go from the gym to the fight in downtown Manhattan. He hopped the indifferent turn style. The police were hiding behind the wall on 149th and 3rd Ave. Darius pleaded with them that he needed this fight to pay his child support. They just laughed at him. He had an outstanding warrant for not paying another minor violation for littering. Two years later and skinnier than ever, he continued to languish in prison. We went to visit him on the boat in Hunts Point. He was all smiles trying to shrug off and conceal his emotions. The slimmest inmate on the boat, he made a joke out of everything but the pain was visceral. Another dream was deferred…
Women came a long way from nothing, so when you have a women running your gym it is crazy for me to hear. Even for me the women is something that is precious like a Diamond so for rules to surpass of the right to have a top off is a bit much. For the law itself has allowed for a women to be loplets walking in the streets of NYC is accepted. Just to keep pess your way of controlling the problem is incredible. There fear of a cop goes as far as to imagine but there will always be a way out of the hood people love to say. Most families fear that there family will be next to have to go throw police brutality, “i can be next”, is something that we all hear. Or “not all cops are the same”, or “I have faith that there is cops out there trying to make a difference”. You’re right Professor there all out for their own, all have no chose but to follow a order. It is to bad there is sometime police really out here trying to hurt people that are trying to move up in life or try to make there dream come true. very sorry about your friend but all cops are doing is depressing for even me to hear about.
Unfortunately society respect the wealthy ones because they have money and Police always are discriminating low class because they dont have the knowledge and the money to look for good lawyers and do something about it, Instead of Police helping minorities they abuse them..
The Hood wont change, but the people in it would even though you take them out of the hood they will always have a part of them always. a Woman running a boxing gym is well grounded and inform of a mans well being a attitude, she use her role as a woman to bring a village together and each one teach one tactic.
I agree with you the police are some how representing the interest of the upper classes. people should be given chances to reform themselves instead of keeping them in jails. And messing up with their entire livelihood with these criminal records.
Each article I read makes shocks me more than the previous one, is really hard to believe that these are the realities that we live in, see how police is doing as they please and no one is stopping them, like if they own us and can do with us as much as they want to. You are totally right when you say that police is technically following orders of the upper class ( who is a minority and don’t face the struggles that we do everyday) play with us like if they were playing a game affecting our futures, records like if it is a joke, committing hundreds of iniquities towards us and with this oppressing us even more .
Its great that a woman could run a business just like a man, but is kind of disrespectful when you trying to make some one else to look bad just because. I agree with some of the replies that you find here. However we have to see that police are there to help out the community, but they are just helping out the white people and that is not fair we all deserve the same respect.
The relationship between the police and the community is a very bad one. Many police officers might not even want to become a police officer, but the ly become one so that they can provide for themselves and their families. This is why so many officers’ morals are low because of the way people perceive them and that is with hate.
I was waiting for the strong woman to appear in all of the chaos of your gym. Mean Debbie seems like a great person to have around in order to restore things to how they’re supposed to be, like a mother taming her children. Nicaraguan Pete seemed to be a reasonable guy based on your brief tale of him, but I feel as though his mistreatment was a bit unnecessary due to the fact that all cops aren’t bad cops. Yet, on the flip side the guys who just graduated from the police academy were the epitome of everything many minorities know as brutal cops. Their bragging about being violent towards those they arrest was disgusting and inhumane.
The different cultures affected by boxing is unparalleled to any other martial art in my opinion, from the Irish men on the island to the slums of 149 st. Grand Concourse Bronx, NY. This is a fragment of locations boxing has impacted on people, especially young poor men. Though in this section you do mention “Mean Debbie”, I can only imagine the size of her hands. The truth is women can become fighter just like men but it’s just not a lady like for females ,it just doesn’t happen. I believe we should encourage our, sisters, daughters, and especially mothers to start boxing or at least self defence classes because places like here in the Bronx it’s so easy to be mugged or jumped for a phone or even stereo headphones. As sad as it is people have to rob you for your possessions their just too poor or have know knowledge about jobs or can’t get one at this point, as a victim of this violence, after my second time being jumped in front of the 5 bus stop in Hunts Point I started training in Shotokan Karate and this made me feel better about any situation that may have presented itself after that day.
Debbie was “The Man” in the boxing gym , that’s good she maintain that attitude to keep everything into place but as well it wasn’t nice for her to lie on you lol. Moreover the police back then were horrible glad i didn’t have to experienced with the police. yes it very different when you actually become a police but to take advantage of your power isn’t great way especially with your friends.
What I think is important in this reading, is that sometimes we wish for the respect of others, but our own actions might change the way people feel towards us (from respect to fear.) I do like that she seems like the kind of person who will not let anyone step on her (same as me), however that strong character might not favor her.
It’s hard for poor people to make in this world, saying that you have to work hard to earn anything you want in life, reading those story make you work hard go to school and get an education so you can become someone in life.
These police nowadays lead double life`s, they lock up innocent black and brown men but smoke drugs and deal drugs on the side, they stop and frisk young Blacks and Latinos and then place drugs on them to put them in jail to collect there commission, for the week for making a higher number of arrest.
The police has demonstrated misconduct by breaking their political contract and abuse their power for personal or departmental gain. People feel harassed by the police because the police continues to use their higher power for the wrong reasons. Society should feel protected by the police not afraid of their lives. Poverty has increased and unfortunately the system has labeled minorities as inferior and uneducated. I believe those who have the privilege to gain a high school diploma and further their education should take advantage of the opportunity because life is very hard especially when we are being classified as criminals, uneducated, unprofessional, good for nothing and the list goes on and on.
It is terrible Professor Shaw, the women disrespected you. Mean Debbie was probably jealous that she wasn’t allowed to wrestle anymore; she was upset that they couldn’t let her wrestle, and they couldn’t trained her without the shirts. Professor Shaw, it was nice that you asked Mean Debbie if she wanted to eat something. After I read “Making Enemies” part, I was upset that Mean Debbie wasn’t behaving nicely. She should have kept emotion to herself. The police always locked up the young black and Hispanic people. The society doesn’t matter to cops, no matter what is your race is. Whoever is racist in this country, I would say cops. Cops harass black and Hispanic people.
The society we live in is a dangerous site. We live in a world where you have to be on one side or the other, you have to pick and choose the ground you walk on, the way the system is going they are pushing the low income majority into one area so that the higher range income can come and take over or may i say colonize the Bronx. These cops are ruthless they have no option of judgement its one way and one way only. Do we really matter anymore? Will we “minorities” ever have a right away? Its a sad scary world we live in.
This was so heart breaking. The fact that a man literally begged an officer to let him pay his child support and was laughed at. To do 2 years for hopping a turnstile is ridiculous ! Although I don’t find myself hating the police I agree with your view that they are just puppets for the white ruling class. But what is the lesser of 2 evils? To be a starving, broke, boxer who can never make it into that top .05 percent or to have a somewhat stable job with benefits that can actually help you take your family out of the projects. I would rather not find my son amongst the Pathmark zombies but I would also not want to abuse my power. As I read on I can’t say that I wasn’t hoping that somewhere in this blog was an epic description of the showdown between you and Debbie.
I find it very upsetting that the same guys you used to fight with, went ahead and became police officers to be big jerks with a badge! You would think that because they are from the hood they would show some sort of mercy for the minority’s but I guess they just became traitors. I met a female police officer before who once told me that when they join the force they teach them to not see color and not even within themselves. They have some sort of pledge where they call each other blue, the color of their uniform and some of them get so wrapped up in that pledge to the point where they feel that they’re better than everyone.
Honestly, police officers do the most unnecessary things. He could’ve let Darius go, plenty of people hop the train. It’s not like they found a murder weapon on him. The police just want to bring in guys to make it appear as though they’re doing something, when they’re really not. While they’re focused on one person hopping the train because they didn’t have the fare, someone is actually committing crimes and the public remains in danger.
in regards to the conditions of the rat’s nest, I feel that those who used the gym could have made fundraisers to gather up money to help pay for repairs that were needed. also, its funny that people claimed ownership of an area of the gym they did not own, the owner should not have allowed such pettiness in his gym. I wonder why mean Debbie was so mean. I really liked how you handled that situation because like you said you already have enough stress outside of the gym. it showed maturity and respect. I can definitely understand why trainers would see their fighters as their own child and most valuable possession. you spend a lot of time with your trainer training that you become to feel like family. the trainer also gets paid if you get paid and make it further into the boxing career. it is sad and true that our young generations have a better chance of seeing prison bars than obtaining a high school diploma. Pete definitely knew he crossed the line by becoming a police officer, especially being someone who grew up in the hood, that is exactly why he asked you not to tell anyone else. shame on pete mainly because there were other jobs available so what was the real excuse?. doing time for jumping a turnstile and littering is not a good judgment call at all. I feel that the judge could have placed Darius in a mandated program that provides carfare and food as well as other resources that will give him more opportunities in life.
Sometimes the smell and environment of a significant place is what stays with one the
most.
Each part of the article comes with different experience. I really like how mean Debbie was managing the gym. It shows another side of feminism. Women always like to take their job seriously especially when they are in power, they don’t play at all. The only thing that that I didn’t like about her was when she lied on you, she didn’t have to do that. Also about the police, “they represent the law of the rich and white world” I agree with you on that. The police are always looking for the next black scapegoat to arrest instead of helping us, don’t get me wrong, I know there are few police officers that are good and innocent, but majority of them target people of color. And the few black people ghat join the police force seems to turn against their own people.
I find it fascinating that you, professor, had absolutely no idea you were fighting a rapist and won against him. I also find it scary how these boxers do not know who they are in the ring with. All they know is his current record and nothing of his background. But in a way, it is interesting to see how no matter what their background is and who they are as a person, these people unite in a gym or at a fight. They are all there for the one interest they have in common; boxing.